Latest data from the Resolution Foundation suggests that workers aged 23 and over will have to be paid an hourly rate of at least £11.46 hourly rate from next year
Hundreds of thousands of staff on the National Living Wage are due to benefit (
Image: Western Mail)
Low-paid workers could see their pay hiked to about £11.46 an hour next year – the third biggest annual increase on record, analysts predict today.
Stronger than expected wage growth means the National Living Wage could hit the level next April – well above the £11 suggested by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, according to a Resolution Foundation briefing. About 1.7 million workers would benefit, says the living standards think tank.
Its briefing, which uses the Low Pay Commission’s methods to calculate what the rate could rise to next year, says it would be worth more than a pound an hour extra for staff on the NLW. The Foundation’s calculation, which uses latest pay data including this week’s Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2023, implies the NLW will rise to £11.46 an hour next year – up from the current £10.42. The rate applies to workers aged 23 and over and is the rebranded minimum wage.
Resolution Foundation senior economist Nye Cominetti said: “This would be a huge pay increase that will help millions of low earners as they navigate the cost-of-living crisis.” The forecast 10% increase would be the third largest percentage cash increase in the minimum wage during its 26-year history. Based on the Bank of England’s inflation expectations, it would mean a real-terms increase of 6.3%.
However, the Foundation warns that for some low earners, big rises in the minimum wage over the past decade have been undermined by Tory austerity attacks on the welfare system. Cuts to working-age benefits have reduced – or even wiped out – increases in their overall household disposable incomes.
A single parent with one child receiving benefits and earning the minimum wage has seen their real income after inflation rise by just 4% in the last 10 years, experts say. “The situation is starker still for a NLW earner with three children, where the addition of the two-child limit on benefits introduced in April 2017 has meant that their income has fallen by 3% in real terms over the past decade,” adds the Foundation.
Mr Cominetti said: “A higher minimum wage alone cannot deliver higher living standards for everyone. Over the past decade, cuts to working-age benefits have offset the gains from the National Living Wage for many. Low-paid families with children in receipt of benefits will have experienced next to no, or even negative, income growth over this period – despite their hourly pay rising by 27% in real terms. A strategy to boost the living standards of low earners must combine a higher minimum wage with better conditions at work and a stronger social security safety net as well.”
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