In his an­nu­al Labour Day ad­dress to work­ers on Mon­day at Char­lie King Junc­tion in Fyz­abad, An­cel Ro­get, the head of the Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM), called for the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage of T&T to be in­creased from $17.50 to $30 an hour.

In per­cent­age terms, Mr Ro­get’s call would amount to a 71.42 per cent in­crease in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage.

As­sum­ing an eight-hour work­day, the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage of $17.50 an hour amounts to $140 a day, $700 a week and $2,800 a month.

Giv­en the es­ca­la­tion in the cost of liv­ing in the last two years, mak­ing ends meet must be very dif­fi­cult for a sin­gle par­ent earn­ing the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage.

The Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice (CSO) es­ti­mates that the av­er­age price of food and non-al­co­holic bev­er­ages in­creased by 20.81 per cent in the two years be­tween April 2021 and April 2023.

The CSO al­so es­ti­mates that the cost of trans­porta­tion in­creased by 17.25 per cent be­tween April 2021 and April 2023.

The all-items in­dex, which is the mea­sure­ment of the so-called head­line in­fla­tion rate, was 11.33 per cent high­er in April 2023 than in April 2021.

His­to­ry of min­i­mum

wage in­creas­es

Ac­cord­ing to the Min­istry of Labour web­site, the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage rate was in­tro­duced in T&T in April 1998.

Here, ac­cord­ing to the Min­istry of Labour web­site, are the changes in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage rate over the last 25 years:

* The na­tion­al min­i­mum was first es­tab­lished at $7 per hour in 1998 and was sub­se­quent­ly in­creased to $8 per hour in Jan­u­ary 2003. That was a 14.28 per cent in­crease over a pe­ri­od of close to five years;

* The min­i­mum wage was in­creased from $8 to $9 per hour in March 2005, which was an in­crease of 12.5 per cent in a lit­tle over two years;

* The na­tion­al min­i­mum wage was in­creased from $9 per hour to $12.50 per hour with ef­fect from Jan­u­ary 2010. That is an in­crease of 38.88 per cent in a lit­tle un­der five years;

* Five years lat­er, the min­i­mum wage was in­creased from $12.50 per hour to $15 per hour with ef­fect from Jan­u­ary 2015. That was a 20 per cent in­crease af­ter five years; and

* On De­cem­ber 1, 2019, the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage was in­creased from $15 to $17.50 per hour, which was a 16.66 per cent in­crease af­ter near­ly five years.

What is in­ter­est­ing is that in dis­clos­ing the Gov­ern­ment’s plan to in­crease the min­i­mum wage to $17.50 an hour, which he did in the 2020 bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion de­liv­ered on Oc­to­ber 7, 2019, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert said: “This mea­sure will ben­e­fit ap­prox­i­mate­ly 194,000 per­sons in the work­force.”

Ac­cord­ing to the Cen­tral Bank’s da­ta cen­tre, the labour force in T&T in 2019 was 617,300. If the Fi­nance Min­is­ter’s work­force is the same as the Cen­tral Bank’s labour force, then peo­ple earn­ing the min­i­mum wage con­sti­tut­ed 31.42 per cent of the labour/work force in 2019. That near­ly one-third of the work­force (labour force) in 2019 would have ben­e­fit­ted from the in­crease in the min­i­mum wage sug­gests that near­ly one-third of the work­force (labour force) was earn­ing the min­i­mum wage four years ago.

By my cal­cu­la­tion, and start­ing from a base of $7 an hour in 1998, the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage rate is 150 per cent high­er in 2023 than it was 25 years ear­li­er.

The na­tion­al min­i­mum wage has been in­creased five times in the 20 years since the first in­crease in 2003. That sug­gests an in­crease in the wage on av­er­age once every four years. If that is cor­rect, T&T should be in line for an in­crease in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage this year or next year.

Should the in­crease be the 71.42 per cent in­di­cat­ed by Mr Ro­get in his Labour Day ad­dress?

I think not be­cause T&T does not have a tra­di­tion of grant­i­ng large, one-time in­creas­es in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage.

Al­so, be­fore grant­i­ng any in­crease in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage, econ­o­mists from the Gov­ern­ment, the Cen­tral Bank, busi­ness groups and the labour or­gan­i­sa­tions need to study the im­pact of large, one-time in­creas­es in the min­i­mum wage on the rate of in­fla­tion and the stan­dard of liv­ing of coun­tries. Might I sug­gest that those econ­o­mists start by look­ing at the re­cent ex­pe­ri­ences of Ar­genti­na and Turkey?

But a more mod­er­ate in­crease in the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage is cer­tain­ly re­quired with­in the next six months. I would sug­gest a 20 per cent in­crease that would take the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage from $17.50 now to $21. The six-month time frame would be nec­es­sary for econ­o­mists to con­duct a prop­er analy­sis of the im­pact of min­i­mum-wage in­creas­es on in­fla­tion rates and cor­po­rate tax col­lec­tion. That analy­sis should start with T&T’s own ex­pe­ri­ence of the im­pact that in­creas­ing the min­i­mum wage has had on the coun­try’s in­fla­tion rate.

Process of in­creas­ing

the min­i­mum wage

An­oth­er is­sue is whether the Gov­ern­ment has the struc­ture in place to in­crease the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage.

The Min­i­mum Wages Act, which is dat­ed June 18, 1976, states at sec­tion 3, that the Min­is­ter of Labour may “fix min­i­mum wages and terms and con­di­tions of ser­vice for any class of work­ers gen­er­al­ly or for any class of work­ers in a par­tic­u­lar in­dus­try or un­der­tak­ing or where sat­is­fied that it is nec­es­sary to do so, fix a na­tion­al min­i­mum wage ap­plic­a­ble to work­ers gen­er­al­ly.”

At sec­tion 4, the Act states that the Min­is­ter of Labour SHALL ap­point a Min­i­mum Wages Board.

This board SHALL con­sist of sev­en mem­bers in­clud­ing one mem­ber nom­i­nat­ed by the as­so­ci­a­tions most rep­re­sen­ta­tive of em­ploy­ers, one mem­ber rep­re­sent­ed by the as­so­ci­a­tions most rep­re­sen­ta­tive of labour and one Gov­ern­ment rep­re­sen­ta­tive.

Sec­tion 6 of the Act states the Min­i­mum Wages Board: “SHALL ad­vise and make rec­om­men­da­tions to the min­is­ter on all mat­ters re­lat­ing to the fix­ing of min­i­mum wages and terms and con­di­tions of ser­vice.”

Has the law been bro­ken by not hav­ing a Min­i­mum Wages Board in place to ad­vise and make rec­om­men­da­tions to the Min­is­ter on the fix­ing of a min­i­mum wage?

That ques­tion is on­ly asked be­cause the Min­istry of Labour’s web­site ref­er­ences for­mer Min­is­ter of Labour Jen­nifer Bap­tiste-Primus de­liv­er­ing in­stru­ments of ap­point­ment to the “new­ly ap­point­ed Min­i­mum Wages Board” on Tues­day, May 16, 2017. That board was ap­point­ed for a pe­ri­od of three years. Has a new board been ap­point­ed?