{"id":2876,"date":"2023-02-08T16:58:45","date_gmt":"2023-02-08T03:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=2876"},"modified":"2023-02-08T16:58:45","modified_gmt":"2023-02-08T03:58:45","slug":"minimum-wage-set-to-increase-by-1-50-an-hour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=2876","title":{"rendered":"Minimum wage set to increase by $1.50 an hour"},"content":{"rendered":"

The minimum wage is set to increase by $1.50 an hour with the government saying the impact on inflation will be “negligible”.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has announced the move to a new rate of $22.70 per hour from 1 April as part of a raft of changes as the government resets its agenda heading into the general election in October.<\/p>\n

The Starting-Out and Training minimum wage rates will be maintained at 80 percent of the adult minimum wage.<\/p>\n

“I do understand that a number of small businesses will have concerns about this decision, however in a cost of living crisis we can’t leave those on the lowest incomes behind,” Hipkins said at his post-Cabinet media briefing.<\/p>\n

“An inflation-adjusted lift to the minimum wage will mean that thousands of New Zealanders don’t go backwards.”<\/p>\n

He said past experiences with minimum wage increases showed people were unlikely to lose their jobs as a result.<\/p>\n

“Those concerns have been raised every time the minimum wage has been increased and we’ve got record low unemployment.”<\/p>\n

\"Prime<\/p>\n

Chris Hipkins says he is honouring a commitment he gave when he became prime minister.\u00a0<\/span>Photo:\u00a0RNZ \/ Angus Dreaver<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Hipkins said when first taking over the role he had promised to do more to help families cope with the cost of living.<\/p>\n

“I am concerned for those in our communities who are feeling the greatest financial pain at this time and that includes those on the minimum wage.<\/p>\n

“They make impossible trade-offs between food and medical care, dry homes, clothing for their children. These families need our support now more than ever.”<\/p>\n

In a statement before the briefing the prime minister said the inflation-adjusted lift in the minimum wage “will means thousands of New Zealanders do not go backwards”.<\/p>\n

The government was conscious of the need to find the right balance, however, it was unlikely the $1.50 an hour increase would complicate the battle to get on top of inflation.<\/p>\n

“The impact on inflation is negligible. In the 2022 Review, MBIE estimates that an increase of 7 percent in the minimum wage will have only a minor inflationary impact of 0.1 percent on the wages portion of GDP,” Hipkins said.<\/p>\n

In its sweeping policy reset, the government has scrapped plans for the RNZ-TVNZ merger and pushed back work on hate speech and its social insurance scheme. The biofuels mandate has been halted and changes to the Three Waters programme will be considered.<\/p>\n

SOURCE\u00a0 RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The minimum wage is set to increase by $1.50 an hour with the government saying the impact on inflation will be “negligible”. Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has announced the move to a new rate of $22.70 per hour from 1 April as part of a raft of changes as the government resets its agenda heading […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":2877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2876"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2878,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2876\/revisions\/2878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}