Venezuela to boost minimum wage by 25%

[ensho]

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/9258319/venezuela-to-boost-minimum-wage-by-25/


President Hugo Chavez has announced a 25 per cent increase for Venezuela's minimum wage starting on May 1.

Chavez says workers will get a 15 per cent boost in pay at the beginning of May.

They will get the remaining 10 per cent rise on September 1.

The wage increase announced on Monday will benefit close to 3 million people, who will earn $A340 a month once the full increase is phased in.
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good

[xchrom]

1. recommend

[lumpy]

2. Looks like Chavez cares about welfare of Venezuelan citizens .

Wish I could say the same about so many politicians in the US who are only concerned with lining their own pockets.

[SoCalDem]

3. How interesting.. People who make more money will BUY stuff

and stimulate the economy.. whodathunkit? and they also tend to be less frustrated, angry , and less likely to resort to criminal activities..

[WatsonT]

7. Actually they'll buy less

as this increase will be less than the increase in costs for goods.

[upi402]

8. 2/3 of voters support raising it here

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/06/americans-minimum-wage-poll_n_752921.html

Our party would actually support this. But will not do a damn thing about it. Wonder what the polls say?

25% is from 8.75 to 10.94 here.
A start.

[Broderick]

4. Do they have an

inflation issue there? Seems, something should start being discussed in the US about minimum wage being that food, clothing, and gas prices are going up and up.

[WatsonT]

6. Yes, and inflation is greater than this increase

meaning real wages are still dropping.

[WatsonT]

5. Key fact left out: inflation rates

inflation is at 27% in Venezuela right now.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13194440

Increasing min. wage by 25% as prices go up by 27% means the poor actually see their real wages drop.

It would have to be 27% or greater increase to be meaningful.