From Mini to Maxi Jobs? Low Pay, In-Work Progression, and the Duty to Work (Harder)

This was a conference paper at the Annual Conference of the Socio-Legal Studies Association 2017, Newcastle University. The main focus of the presentation was low pay and the operation of current redistributive mechanisms.

The scale of low pay and growth in-work poverty highlights serious shortcomings in the two main mechanisms for tackling low wages, ie the statutory minimum wage and Universal Credit. The main argument in the presentation was that both systems are currently unfit for purpose. Despite the introduction of the NWL in April 2016, the UC scheme, and a controversial in-work progression scheme aimed at moving workers on UC to closer to new conditionality earnings threshold targets, the prospects for the low paid working in the bottom three deciles of the wage distribution are poor with at least one in five workers currently low paid. Depending on which definition is used that can rise to one in four. The paper went on to argue that on the labour side of the labour-social security interface new approaches are needed, including the construction of sectoral minimum wage floors and pay scales giving effect to recommendations by the Bain Commission and in the Manifesto for Labour Law. On the social security side remedial work is also needed, particularly in restoring the original design features of UC and enhancing the scope and value of work allowances.