Minimum Wages Debate Assessment Answer

Answer :

Minimum Wages Debate

Issues

The debate over the minimum wages has been found and exposed to the sharp class divisions in Australian society. It is found that majority of the working people in Australia to support an increase in the wages from AUD $ 7.35 to $ 10- 15 for the hour. In the minimum wages debate, it is assessed that Australian unions are pushing the increase in the minimum wages but some of the retail business organizations and small business organizations are going against it due to its impact on their business costing. In the minimum wages, Australian council of trade union focused on increasing the weekly wages to the minimum wages which would result to 7.2% increase in the existing wages (Neumark, Salas, & Wascher, 2014).  The key stakeholders impacted by the minimum wages debate would be employees, small organizations and retail stores who are being given or giving the wages less than the minimum wages criteria. The retails stores and small organizations are against this debate and they are revealing that they are already struggling while passing on to their business cost. If there would be increase in the minimum wages then it will not only impact their business costing but also lower down their business efficiency (Cengiz, Dube, Lindner, & Zipperer, 2019), On the other hand, start-ups and other small organization also have negative point of view for this minimum wages. They divulges that it will have negative impact on their business sustainability when there is already low of profitability in the business. The council of small business Australia is showing positive indicator to determine the minimum wages considering the employee’s welfare and development.  There are several labour unions which have also shown their interest in supporting the minimum wages debate in Australia with a view to promote this proposal. They are claiming that it will not only make their life better but also result to increase in their living standards in society (Broecke, Quintini, & Vandeweyer, 2018).  Nonetheless, the increment in the minimum wages would be tough for the employers of the small organizations and companies. They will not only see the impact on their business efficiency but also has to face loss in their profitability due to the increased business costing. 

Analysis 

In the statement given by chief executive officer of the Australian chamber of commerce and industry, (James Pearson), it was argued that the wage rise proposed in this case is way too high and it might be the negative factor for the business survival for the small business organization.  The key issue faced by the employers of the small business organization and start-up would be related to the business costing and survival in the market. However, the proposed increase in the minimum wages would be beneficial for the employees but the impact of this increase would be seen on other business activities of organization (Williams, 2018).  Most of the companies in Australia are focusing on developing the triple bottom line business framework for their organization to align their business interest with the organization development (Adema, et al. 2019).  The triple bottom line allows organization to customize its business more employees and stakeholders oriented irrespective of its impact on the profit. Nonetheless, with the increase in the minimum wages, employers might face issue to manage the budget maintain the triple bottom line business framework in their inbound and outbound activities. However, it will have dire repercussions of ignoring the TBL business frameworks by the organization but it will be the only pathway to fight with the increased business costing (Cengiz, et al. 2019).  All the employers faces issue of increased wages due to following impacts such as low amount of profitability, high complexities to cover the business costing, low level of CSR activities, reduction in business society development funding and reduction in the business efficiency (Caraway, Ford, & Nguyen, 2019).  Therefore, the increment in the minimum wages would be having direct impact on the business sustainability considering the triple bottom line as it will be only path way for the employers to lower down their business costing and increase the efficiency (Monras, 2019).

Position / critique

To,

Fair Work Commission

Being employer of the small organization, I have following points to put across in the forum for the minimum wages debate. The proposed % of the minimum wages is 7.3% which is way too higher in context with the market condition and development. It is found that the increment in the minimum wages has direct impact on the profitability, high complexities to cover the business costing, low level of CSR activities, reduction in business society development funding and reduction in the business efficiency (Bishop, 2018). If these higher level of the minimum wages is implemented then it will be hard for employers to sustain in the market. It will be impossible to cover the business costing with the existing prices of the goods and services offered in market (Grasso, 2016). It will result to revision in the offered price to the clients. This will diminish the market and also increase the sustainability risk. Therefore, considering these factors, we being employers propose the increment in the minimum wages from 1.5 % to 2.4 % which would be easy for the employers to bear in their business costing. Furthermore, there could be different provisions for the well-established organizations and small organizations to support the employees in market. All the small organizations and start-ups should be given rebate from the provision of minimum wages for some time so that they could at least make their business to survive in market (Wilson, 2017).  However, well-established business organizations could be forced to pay minimum wages to employees. Therefore, considering the business sustainability and strengthen the economic value, it could be inferred that the increment in the minimum wages should be reduced to 1.5 % to 2.4% so that it could not impact the business sustainability of the companies.