Today’s unemployment figure of 3.9% has done nothing to stop the real terms pay cut workers are facing from getting worse, despite the Morrison Government’s repeated promises.
The Coalition Government has been promising wage growth for almost a decade, but Australian workers have suffered through years of record low wage growth and now are seeing their wages go dramatically backwards in real terms.
Yesterday’s wage growth figures show that inflation is growing more than twice as fast as people’s pay packets.
The headline unemployment figure hides the reality of work for millions of Australians. The number of people working multiple jobs is at a record high, and one in three Australians are in insecure work.
Quotes attributable to ACTU Secretary Sally McManus:
“Australians are sick of waiting for wage growth that Prime Minister Scott Morrison keeps telling them would follow when unemployment was low. Well, unemployment has been low for six months now and in every one of those months, workers’ wages have gone backwards in real terms.
“The Morrison Government now has no solutions and no plans to support Australian workers getting pay rises. The truth is that this Government will never act to generate wage growth for working people. He will not even support the lowest paid workers getting a $1 an hour wage increase.
“We also have nearly 1 in 3 workers in insecure work. It’s hard to bargain for the pay increase when you don’t even know if you’ll get any hours tomorrow. Morrison has no solution to insecure work.
“The low headline unemployment rate hides the record high number of Australians working multiple jobs, or unable to find enough hours to make ends meet.
“Australia can’t afford another three years of Scott Morrison refusing to fight for wage growth.”
