Minimum wage is going up, but it’s still nowhere near a living wage

Ontario's minimum wage is set for another bump later this year, rising 35 cents to $17.95 an hour.

But is that a living wage? Not even close.

On tonight’s episode of Village Media’s Closer Look podcast, we dig deeper into the numbers with Craig Pickthorne of the Ontario Living Wage Network.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

And this is a condition that we're manufacturing by, you know, making it so that the minimum wage is ten dollars less than a living wage.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Zach is here. Mr. Friscalante is here. Scott Sexmith, fresh out of the uh research vault. You ready for this? Yes. Mel B was Scary Spice, Melanie C was Sporty Spice, Emma Bunton was Baby Spice, Jerry Hollowell, Ginger Spice, and of course we know Victoria Beckham.

SPEAKER_03 0:54

Are they was or is? They're probably still they still go by it. You're always the Beatles, right? Yeah. The stones. You know, and all in all seriousness, as I was researching the Spice Girls, because we it was mentioned by um Doug Ford's business minister in justifying the uh FOI changes. I kind of took a little bit of a dig at them in my column uh writing about it. Um but just because I was trying to figure out uh if I had the song title right in because I referenced the song title. They were huge. They were huge. They were massive. And and what they did for the girl power uh and and and the influence they had on so many uh musicians to come, uh it was like because there were so many, you know, quote unquote boy bands, but there wasn't anything like the Spice Girls. There was not. Massive cultural uh and I and I guess I didn't pay attention at the time where I wasn't not much into music anyway, so I think that's part of what it is. They were huge. And then there was rumors of a reunion, Scott. There was. So anyways, the invitation's open if any of the Spice Girls want to come on and talk, A, about a potential reunion. Yes. And B about what they think of the Ford government's FOI changes, uh, I'm in. I'm sure they're deep thoughts. They're dying to weigh in on that. But they you know what? They might be all for uh uh democratic transparency. They strike me as uh you know the girl power and power to uh the people. Damn right. I don't know. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 2:07

Power to the people. Uh okay. Speaking uh of people and uh requiring a uh living wage to get by, uh I'm really looking forward to this conversation. Uh there's a new 35 cent raise coming uh to Ontario's minimum wage. Uh that's gonna kick in October the first. That will now take minimum wage to$17.95 an hour. Yes. But if you do the math on that, let's say that you work 40 hours a week at$17.95, you're still earning less than$38,000 a year. And I think the poverty line in Ontario is$27,000 or just over$27,000. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 2:41

So that gap is not And the reality is you on that wage, how do you rent a place in any big city or any really any city in Ontario? It's very different. And this is the gap. And and so Craig is from the Ontario Living Wage Network, which which kind of calculates, which you know, kind of, they do. They calculate what an actual living wage is in the communities across Ontario and encourage employees to get on board paying workers. And they have hundreds of employees that that are on there. So we're gonna chat with him about the minimum wage jump, but also how we get that fill that gap between what minimum wage actually is and what the living wage is.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

A 35 cent raise is coming to Ontario's minimum wage this fall. On paper, that's a boost tied to inflation, the kind of steady, predictable increase governments like to point to. But here's the reality: even with that bump, full-time minimum wage workers in Toronto are still about$9 an hour short of what it actually costs to live. So this isn't really about a raise, it's about a gap that doesn't seem to be closing. Craig Pickthorne is with the Ontario Living Wage Network, and he joins us now to talk about what that gap looks like and why it's still there. Craig joins us tonight from Ottawa. Craig, welcome to Closer Look. We appreciate your time. Well, thank you for having me. This is great. Uh, Craig, in real terms, what does that roughly$9 gap uh between minimum wage and a living wage actually mean in someone's day-to-day life?

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Well, this is a pretty well-studied uh phenomenon. Uh people have to hold down multiple jobs. They might have to enter the gig economy. Um, you know, other household members might have to also work where they wouldn't have before. And you probably will have to at one point have to make a decision about what you're gonna cut and what you're gonna go into arrears on uh month to month. So that's that's the reality that we know about very well. Um, when you just can't, you may if you work full-time, you should be able to make ends meet. You should be able should be able to pay your bills, but we know that's not the case anywhere in the province if you're working a full-time minimum wage job even after the increase on October 1st.

SPEAKER_03 4:45

I think there's about 700,000 people in the province right now earning minimum wage. Yeah, there are numbers uh research you guys have done on how many of those are actually working more than 40 hours that are juggling two minimum wage jobs, for example.

SPEAKER_02 4:56

I bet there is because there's there's uh you know uh places of research and policy that dive into this uh much better than we can. But places like the Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, for example, will have some most excellent uh research on that.

SPEAKER_01 5:12

Craig, you've said uh people are choosing uh which bills to fall behind on. What are you hearing from workers about the kinds of decisions that uh they're being forced to make?

SPEAKER_02 5:23

Well, when you look at uh the spike in costs of um, you know, uh fuel and in food, especially and other things like that, people are going to have to start to tighten because there's something that, you know, there's one thing that you can't, you know, jostle around, which is uh shelter costs. Uh you'll just, you know, you're running into trouble there, obviously. So people have to, um, you know, that's the baseline, and then they have to make adjustments in other um areas of the the wallet, right? This is a known thing. And this is a condition that we're manufacturing by, you know, making it so that the minimum wage is$10 less than a living wage uh in the Toronto area, for example, which is the highest living wage in the province.

SPEAKER_03 6:07

Aaron Powell Part of the balancing act we hear here, you know, whenever I read these stories, whenever it's once a year, they they they change the rate based on inflation. You hear from small business owners, for example, say, oh man, that's gonna be even harder on my bottom line. My margins are gonna be more difficult. How do you respond to that, Craig? Because that's part of the tug of war here, right?

SPEAKER_02 6:25

Sure. And, you know, it's not like we're not sympathetic to small business owners and um people that make our communities a much nicer place to live. Um, but we do have um in our ranks of certified living wage employers, many small businesses as well. We have we have businesses and organizations of all sizes. Uh they anticipate the rise in the living wage every year, and they make plans for it, and they remain certified with us even through very hard times, better times uh through it all. They've remained certified. There's over 600 certified living wage employers in Ontario, and we add more all the time. Um, and they report to us well, here's one thing that I notice when I pay a living wage, I get much better uh recruits that will come through after uh we put out uh a call for um you know a position. We have lower training costs because we have lower turnover. Um, and the number one thing, actually, that we're surprised recently um we ask our employers, what is the what's the number one reason that you became certified and remain certified? They used to say things like the practical things like, well, lower turnover. But now they're starting to say that it's the number one way in which we can communicate our values to the wider public. And values is a is a position that you have to think about now as a business. And uh people are looking to do business or consumers are looking to purchase from a business they can trust is not holding people in working poverty. So that's I think, you know, to answer your question in a very long-winded way, uh, employers make the best recruiters, they make the best arguments about why one would want to pay a living wage. And um, I'll just end it with saying in you know, 2018, the um living or minimum wage went up from$11 in change to$14, the largest increase we have ever seen. Uh, you know, the predictions were very dire that uh there'd be uh complete decimation of the economy and the job market would bottom out and jobs would disappear. Uh none of that really happened in the next very next year in 2019, we saw an increase in employment in Ontario. So we just ran the largest experiment there ever was, and none of those predictions came true. That's not how I would make the case to an employer. Uh, but I would, I would just, but just for our discussion's sake, that's uh that's a fact that you can't really argue.

SPEAKER_03 8:51

Those are all great points. I appreciate it. We should have asked this off the top. Just tell our listeners who don't aren't aware, what is the Ontario Living Wage Network? What do you guys do?

SPEAKER_02 8:58

Oh, sure. Yeah, we do two things primarily. We uh calculate the local living wage rates for 10 regions in Ontario, covers the whole province. And then um, so we do that every year. We release the new updated rates in November. The second thing we do is we certify and recognize and list uh publicly employers who enter into a legal agreement with us to pay at least a living wage to all their full-time, part-time, and contract employees. And um, and they do so they have to renew that every year. They have to follow any increases to the the living wage rates where they're doing business. And that's the two main things that we do.

SPEAKER_03 9:41

Are there can you use an example of like a business that maybe at first was like hesitant to join up with this and sign on, but they've they've just they're so happy that they did?

SPEAKER_02 9:51

You know, um some larger organizations will enter our program, but it's a tiered um uh entry. So that especially when you have um like contracts, service contracts with, say, cleaners or security guards that come up for renewal, you can't just snap your fingers and you know change the pay structure. So, like a larger municipality, like say uh St. Catharines, Ontario, entered into a uh a scheme like that where they, you know, the they're when when the service contracts are up, they're going to put in a provision for a living wage uh as an example. Um, you know, things like that. There's other businesses that are are have come to us and said we're interested in the living wage certification program. We're not there yet, but we're gonna, you know, make a plan in a couple of years, we're going to be at where we think the living wage will be. And that's not too uncommon as well. We make our calculations are totally public. People are welcome to refer to Ontario LivingWage.ca to see what the living wage rates are and how we get them. And, you know, if they want to find a certified employer in their area.

SPEAKER_01 10:57

Craig, you've uh calculated different living wages uh across Ontario. Uh you mentioned, I think, 10 different places, uh, Ottawa, Hamilton, London. What's driving those differences and are any regions actually getting closer to affordability?

SPEAKER_02 11:12

Sure. Well, in the Southwest, uh, you know, where Windsor uh is, that's one of the more affordable places, as is London at$20 uh$21.05. So what happens is uh always the biggest factor that goes into a living wage calculation is shelter costs, rent, um, and rental insurance, and some hydro. But um, you know, that that's kind of been increasing across the province, but less so in some of those locations like London and and Windsor. Um, and then we look at Toronto at$27.20, is of course of because of the rise in rents there as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:51

And sorry, what was the lowest one? Toronto's the highest. What was the lowest?

SPEAKER_02 11:55

Uh London at uh$21.05.

SPEAKER_03 11:59

So they're actually they're they're catching up, they're catching up a little bit. Uh at$18 is minimum wage, yeah. That's impressive.

SPEAKER_02 12:05

And another factor that goes in is if a city or a location has great transit, then when we do our calculation on our hypothetical family, uh, we have three family types actually that we then average in. Uh when our hypothetical family of four with two small kids doesn't need to have two cars because the city or or whatever has a good transit system, that can also help to keep the living wage increases year to year under control. So it really shows you the power of public services, the power of shared, you know, um services that you can have at your disposal to keep things affordable.

SPEAKER_03 12:43

Absolutely. I remember when I lived in Toronto, all the people that live there are gonna laugh at me, but that was the thing. You didn't have a car, you didn't need a car. I mean, it was great. You jump on any bus, subway, streetcar. Craig, we keep hearing about the economy and how we're facing so many headwinds, it's teetering. We're we're in for some rough months ahead, is what we keep hearing. Um, how much does that concern you and how does that impact employers who would do some say, you know what, maybe we can't do this now and play pay a living wage?

SPEAKER_02 13:07

Yep. Uh, you know, to be honest, uh we look at the at the economic forecast just like anybody else in the province and go, okay, so let's see what happens here. Um out of our control, obviously. Uh we do uh we have experienced, you know, uh slowdowns in the past, and you get obviously a little more attrition than you normally get. Like sadly, you know, there's employers that reach out to us and say, look, I can't I have to close down, so I'm not gonna be able to renew. Obviously, I'm not going to be in business anymore. So it's really sad when you see that happening. Um, but you know, there are employers that are able to uh weather that and so we continue to certify. And, you know, during the the last economic slowdown, we were able to pause um our collection of fees and things like that to make sure that we're able to keep certifying, we're keep our doors open. You know, there's a staff of two, actually, that's it, that runs this whole show, myself included, and uh somebody else in uh Kitchener. So we we make provisions to make sure that we can continue to certify people and uh businesses uh even if there's an economic uh downturn.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

All right, good stuff. Uh Craig, before we let you go tonight, anything that we didn't cover that perhaps we should have.

SPEAKER_02 14:20

Sure. Uh just you know, um we I actually I just wanted to explain. Some people may be curious how do we calculate our living wages? Sure. Uh we look at all the expenses that a worker would have to cover. And we do so for three different family types a family of four, a single adult with one small child and a single adult living alone. And it's, you know, the big ones are rent, transportation, childcare, and food. We also look at like high-speed internet access and a modest vacation. And so when we boil all that down, add in any government taxes or transfers of benefits, what you get is a living wage, uh like an hourly wage that you have to earn in order to make hands meet where you live. And the whole idea is I mean, if you work full-time, you should be able to exist. You should be able to live and pay your bills.

SPEAKER_01 15:04

That's what it's all about. Very well said. There's Craig Pickthorne, the director of communications at the Ontario Living Wage Network, uh, joining us uh tonight from Ottawa. Thanks for this, uh, Craig. Enjoy your long weekend. Thank you. You too, Bice. Uh that's amazing. 700,000 people in the province uh working for minimum wage. And and the misconception is that you hear minimum wage and you automatically think teenagers, right? Yes, yeah. Like part-time jobs. Yep. Not the case.

SPEAKER_03 15:33

No, not at all. There's only it's actually a small percentage that are teenagers. And and as as Craig said, you know, uh they're they're working their 40 hours, but they're probably working, they're often working two jobs. And the gig economy is huge now, too. What do you say, right? They're they're Uber drivers, they're doing all kinds of things to try to make ends meet. Uh like he said, you can check out more on the their website, the Ontario Living Network, uh, Living Wage Network.

SPEAKER_01 15:54

All right, good stuff. That's it for us tonight. Closerlook at villagemedia.ca. That is our email address. Uh sign up, check us out online. You can uh find back episodes at closerlookpodcast.ca. For Zach Trunzo, executive producer of this evening's program, and Michael Friscolanti, our editor in chief here at Village Media. I'm Scott Sexmith. Thanks for your time. Have a great night. We'll see you tomorrow at seven right here on Closer Look.