Youth Rates

Another Sue Bradford bill is in the news again – her youth rates one. The select committee has changed it so it does not abolish youth rates, but restricts their use to the first x hours of employment. They suggest x be 200 but leave it to the Minister of Labour.

The revised bill is here.

As an employer this would not affect me. My company does and has employed a number of staff under 18, and we do not have youth rates. They get paid the same as all other staff, at a rate well above the adult minimum wage. They are also eligible for the normal performance bonuses.

But not all companies are the same. Most companies do already pay more youth workers more than the adult minimum wage. But there are cases where forcing them to do so, may result in young job seekers not gaining work.

I recall at 14 working at Woolworths for $1.99 an hour. It was crap money and a crap job but I was thrilled to just have a job and be earning some money (had also has the obligatory paper runs previously). And it was giving me job experience which made my next part-time job easier to get. It showed I had a good work ethic, doing 2 hours a night after school each night, five hours on Friday night and another seven hours or so on Saturday. I doubt I would have got that job if they had to have paid me the same as the older workers.

Now the compromise bill is a typical compromise – not pleasing either supporters or opponents of the original bill. There is some logic to having “youth rates” tied to how many hours you work, rather than your age, but many employers are already taking account of experience anyway. My staff get paid more after they have been with us for a set period of time, because you gain experience regardless of whether you are 17 or 25.

The 200 hours limit is not binding on the Minister of Labour. It isn’t a terribly long time. Five weeks of full-time work only. Or five months of work at ten hours a week as the CTU point out. It is not time with one employer either, it is total time in the workforce since 16. That presents itself with significant compliance complexity – how do you verify previous work hours?