(08 Sep 2015, 1:19 pm)Andreos1 wrote http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34177370
Living Wage to be used by Whitbread as a reason to increase prices.
An interesting one, which almost negates the point of having a living wage in the first place.
The article goes on to state that roughly 34,000 of Whitbread's 42,000 hourly-paid staff receive less than £7.20 an hour.
Granted it is a smaller proportion, but if the remaining 8,000 received a pay increase, would the price of our coffee go up?
I will put my last £7.20 on at Fozzes bookies, that we will see redundancies and shorter working hours for those 34,000, negating the wage increase.
Without knowing the proportion of hours worked (full/part time) and the split, it is difficult to see how much difference the 70p increase will make to overall profits.
I wonder if a brave retailer would dare to lower prices - on the off-chance the increased money in the back pockets of those affected, may actually tempt consumers to spend more?
Some companies 'boast' about paying wages above the National Minimum Wage even though the difference is often meagre. It will be interesting to see if those companies adjust their wages accordingly to maintain their 'boastful' claims.