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One Hundred Years of British Minimum Wage Legislation

Deakin, Simon, Green, Francis (2009) One Hundred Years of British Minimum Wage Legislation. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 47 (2). pp. 205-213. ISSN 0007-1080. (doi:10.1111/j.1467-8543.2009.00729.x) (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:7694)

The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided.
Official URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2009.00729.x

Abstract

The Trade Boards Act 1909 was a landmark in the development of minimum wage regulation in Britain and around the world. Although their powers were limited, the trade boards had immediate and tangible effects in terms of raising living standards, and over time they became a core part of the system of state support for collective wage determination. While influential overseas, the wages councils (as the trade boards became after 1945) were eventually seen as providing only a partial solution to the problem of low pay. In the 1980s, their powers were reduced under the influence of deregulatory labour market policies, prior to their abolition in 1993. The British national minimum wage (‘NMW’), which was introduced in 1998, despite appearances, is not a universal national minimum of the kind which the Webbs and other Fabian writers argued for a century ago. Notwithstanding a growing consensus that the supposed negative economic effects of the minimum wage have not been borne out by the experience of the NMW, public policy has yet to take fully on board its potential benefits, including the reduction of social costs and the promotion of social partnership.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2009.00729.x
Subjects: H Social Sciences
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Economics
Depositing User: G.F. Green
Date Deposited: 04 Apr 2010 12:47 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Nov 2021 09:45 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/7694 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Green, Francis.

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