As of January 1, 2018, the minimum wage in the Province of Ontario has risen from $11.60 per hour to $14.00 per hour. That is a 20.69 % increase overnight. It is set to rise 7.14 % to $15.00 per hour on January 1, 2019. That is a total increase of 27.83 %. It will still rise again every October based on inflation.
The Province of Ontario had no minimum wage law until the United Farmers of Ontario government (1919 -1923) legislated it for women. The Conservative government of Ontario legislated minimum wage law to include men, at a higher minimum wage than women, in 1925.
To those people who have said the previous minimum wage was not enough, I say stop your complaining and get to work; and hope you are not one of the 50,000 people predicted to lose their jobs because of minimum wage going up. What wage is better than no wage at all?
Minimum wage law is about using force. It is about the socialist ideal, redistribution of wealth from those who earned it to those who did not earn it, eliminating freedom of contract, eliminating competition in the marketplace, and increasing government theft. The government steals a portion of everyone's paycheques through taxes so a minimum wage earners's net pay is actually less than the legal minimum wage.
An employee works 75 hours during a bi-weekly pay period at minimum wage of $11.60 per hour and earns $870.00. The employer must pay the employee 4% vacation pay that is calculated to be $34.80. The employee's gross pay is $904.80. The government takes $38.12 from the employee's pay for Canada Pension Plan (CPP). The employer is forced by government to pay $38.12 to the government for CCP on behalf of the employee. The government takes $15.02 from the employee's pay for Employment Insurance (EI). The employer is forced by government to pay $21.03 for EI on behalf of the employee. The government takes $83.76 from the employee's pay in tax. This leaves the employee with a $767.90 paycheque. Subtracting the $34.80 vacation pay from employee's net pay leaves a wage total of $733.10. Dividing the employee's net wage (less vacation pay) by the 75 hours worked in the bi-weekly pay period means the employee was actually paid $9.77 per hour. That is $1.83 below a $11.60 minimum wage.
An employee works 75 hours during a bi-weekly pay period at minimum wage of $14.00 per hour and earns $1050.00. The employer must pay the employee 4% vacation pay that is calculated to be $42.00. The employee's gross pay is $1092.00. The government takes $47.38 from the employee's pay for Canada Pension Plan (CPP). The employer is forced by government to pay $47.38 to the government for CCP on behalf of the employee. The government takes $18.13 from the employee's pay for Employment Insurance (EI). The employer is forced by government to pay $25.38 for EI on behalf of the employee. The government takes $122.22 from the employee's pay in tax. This leaves the employee with a $904.26 paycheque. Subtracting the $42.00 vacation pay from employee's net wage leaves a total of $862.26. Dividing the employee's net wage (less vacation pay) by the 75 hours worked in the bi-weekly pay period means the employee was actually paid $11.49 per hour. That is $2.51 below a $14.00 minimum wage.
The difference in take home pay of the employee earning a minimum wage of $11.60 per hour and earning a minimum wage of $14.00 per hour for a 75 hour bi-weekly pay period is a net increase of $1.72 per hour.
The government takes $196.05 from the employee's pay who works 75 hours in a bi-weekly pay period at $11.60 per hour. The government takes $260.51 from the employee's pay who works 75 hour in a bi-weekly pay period at $14.00 per hour.
The employer must pay an additional $5, 221.32 per year in wage, CPP, EI, and tax to employ the employee at a minimum wage of $14.00 per hour.
Complete government control over the economy, and keeping people poor. Socialism, Communism, and Fascism. All on the Left. All alive and well in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.
Update: Apparently, the new Ontario Progressive Conservative government has paused the minimum wage increase until 2020. In 2020, the minimum wage may be raised to $15.00 per hour, and then increase each year based on inflation. If true, then the Ontario Progressive Conservatives are following almost exactly the same minimum wage plan of the defeated Ontario Liberal government.
Just Right 515 - July 27, 2017
ONTARIO'S POLITICIANS ON FASCISM’S DOORSTEP
Kevin Flynn, Ontario's Minister of Labour (Liberal) has made it explicitly clear that his government's planned minimum wage increase is not about minimum wages at all. The legislation has been designed primarily for the purpose of exercising the Liberal Party’s Marxist philosophy, most popularly (and incorrectly) understood as: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need..."
“We told our advisors ‘Don’t deal with minimum wage’ because we already have a good handle on that,” Flynn said to interviewer Andrew Lawton on July 10.
“The underlying principle is that there are a number of people in our province that are doing very well these days.” (From each according to his ability…)
“The underlying concern is that people in this province are making less than $15 per hour, which we know is below the poverty level.” (…to each according to his need).
So the whole minimum wage debacle is not about minimum wages at all! It’s about socialist wealth redistribution, plain and simple. Straight from the Labour Minister’s mouth.
Worse, Flynn hinted at government plans to impose a different “business model” on small and medium businesses that pay minimum wages. His apparent intentions are to destroy what little is left of free enterprise and impose complete state control and regulation of small business via fascism – in the service of socialistic wealth redistribution purposes. This movement to the Left has already been well under way for some time in Ontario.
Tragically assumed by many to be offering an alternative to the Wynne Liberals, Patrick Brown, leader of Ontario's Progressive Conservative Party, fully supports both the Marxist principle and fascist plans to increase the minimum wage to $15 per hour. These intentions have been made very explicit and you can hear both Brown and Flynn attest to them in their own words on today’s show.
In political terms, minimum wage laws are properly categorized as being fascist (state control of private property/contract/association, etc.).
Think “fascism” is too strong a word? Consider that, effective January 1 of this year (and fully supported by all members of the legislature), it is now illegal in the province of Ontario to freely associate for political purposes. Yes, political freedom of association has literally been made illegal in the province of Ontario.
This is fascism, and the details of how rapidly fascist policy has taken root in Ontario are alarming. From politics – to minimum wage laws – to fighting climate change, and more, Ontario offers demonstrable proof that fascism sits on the Left, along with its socialist/communist brethren.
No matter how many may disagree with our use of these labels of the Left to describe Ontario today, few would disagree with the corollary: The one thing Ontario is NOT, is Just Right.
- Just Right Media
RUSH TO STOP ONTARIO LABOUR BILL 148
As you know, the Ontario government has introduced Bill 148, the Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act. Left unchanged, this bill will harm workers, especially young and unskilled workers, increase costs for businesses, and make Ontario less competitive. The Ontario government is rushing this bill through the legislature with unprecedented speed. Let your voice be heard. Contact your Member of the Provincial Parliament (MPP) and tell them to stop the rush—good jobs are at stake.
Among the changes included in Bill 148 are:
A minimum wage increase to $14 per hour on Jan. 1, 2018, and to $15 per hour on Jan. 1, 2019 (a 32% increase in 18 months).
A new proposal to implement “Equal Pay for Equal Work” for Temporary Help Agency employees to be paid the same as permanent workers with comparable work/conditions/experience/skills.
New conditions for part-time/casual/seasonal workers to be paid the same as full time workers.
Establish card-based union certification for the temporary help agency industry, the building services sector, home care, and the community services industry.
Increase overtime and public holiday pay.
Increase minimum vacation entitlement for workers from two to three weeks per year (for employment period >5 years).
Allow any employee to take two paid days off with no minimum service, earnings, or doctor’s note required. Thus, a temporary worker could work one hour and receive two days pay with no explanation and no note, and repeat this across multiple agencies each year.
Double the Ministry of Labour’s current complement of workplace inspectors by adding 150 new inspectors.
Bill 148 will lead to:
Fewer Jobs.
Fewer entry-level opportunities for young and unskilled workers looking to build their experience.
Fewer roles for seniors and retired workers who need to earn occasional money to supplement their retirement income.
Less Opportunity.
There will be fewer jobs in Ontario as Bill 148 will make it significantly more expensive to operate a business. Ontario will be less attractive as an investment opportunity.
More costs.
A huge spike in labour challenges from permanent workers who will expect wage parity with temporary workers (often clients pay more for temporary help because a skilled worker on contract can demand higher wages). Significantly higher costs of public holidays for all employers that engage students, part-time employees, casual workers, and temporary help.
Less Productivity.
More red tape, more inspections, and more potential abuse of the emergency-leave provisions and scheduling changes resulting in less work opportunity, frustrated employers, higher business costs, and reduced productivity in Ontario.
- Express Employment Professionals
Another fact should be borne in mind, namely, that the shop we bought was literally a sweat-shop, and that sweat-shops are always made up of inefficient workers who can not get a job in a high-grade shop. Wages in what are known as "inside shops," run by the factories themselves, always start where the sweat-shop wages leave off; thus the wages that were being paid in this shop at the time we took it over, must not be confused with the wages paid in the inside shops of the large clothing manufacturers of Cincinnati.
"We all looked at him, and after a minute's silence he went on: 'Whatever this Golden Rule thing is I don't know, but what Mr. Nash told us was that all he wanted us to do was to work just as we would want him to work if we were up in the office paying wages, and he was back here doing the work. Now I know, if I was the boss and would come in and talk to the workers as he did, and raise wages like he has, I'd want every one to work like hell!'
- The Golden Rule in Business, by Arthur Nash
Back home in Canada, George Weston Limited remained profitable, in spite of the Depression. That allowed the company to do something remarkable for the times — establish a minimum wage for its male employees. In 1934, married men were guaranteed a wage of $22 a week and single men $18 a week.
- Britain’s Biggest Baker
The first thing that happens, for example, when a law is passed that no one shall be paid less than $106 for a forty-hour week is that no one who is not worth $106 a week to an employer will be employed at all. You cannot make a man worth a given amount by making it illegal for anyone to offer him anything less. You merely deprive him of the right to earn the amount that his abilities and situation would permit him to earn, while you deprive the community even of the moderate services that he is capable of rendering. In brief, for a low wage you substitute unemployment. You do harm all around, with no comparable compensation.
- Economics in One Lesson, by Henry Hazlitt
Unfortunately, the real minimum wage is always zero, regardless of the laws, and that is the wage that many workers receive in the wake of the creation or escalation of a government-mandated minimum wage, because they lose their jobs or fail to find jobs when they enter the labor force. Making it illegal to pay less than a given amount does not make a worker’s productivity worth that amount—and, if it is not, that worker is unlikely to be employed.
- Thomas Sowell, Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy
A minimum-wage law is, in reality, a law that makes it illegal for an employer to hire a person with limited skills.
- Milton Friedman
Back in China, after returning to their families for the [Chinese New Year] holiday, most workers stay away for weeks (officially it's a 15 day holiday), and factories have no idea who will come back and who won't, as many people take the opportunity to renegotiate or change jobs. There are usually more jobs than skilled workers to fill them in China, which means workers can pick and choose and are in a strong position to make demands.
- Catherine Clavering
The purpose of businesses is to make a profit, not to provide a service or a product.
- Catherine Clavering