After much speculation and debate the Government has announced a small increase in the minimum wage, to come into effect on 1 April 2010.
The standard (adult) minimum wage will increase 25 cents to $12.75 per hour. That's equivalent to $102 for a standard 8 hour day, or $26,520 per year.
The new entrants minimum wage will increase 20 cents to $10.20 per hour ($81.60 per day, or $21,216 per year).
According to the Beehive website,
"The Government is focused on the need to find a balance between protecting jobs and ensuring a fair wage."
"We do not want to see workers priced out of the market, but we are confident that a 25c increase, in line with inflation, will not overly harm or discourage businesses from taking on new staff."
There have been calls by Unite to increase the minimum wage to $15 per hour, a 20% increase on the current minimum wage, but these calls have been rejected by the Goverment as unreasonable in the current challenging economic climate.
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What is the minimum Salary I should sign my in contact?
Manish, for a full-time position you should expect at least $26520 per year. For hourly rates, expect a minimum of $12.75 per hour (+ holiday pay or time off for holidays).
Don't sign a contract for less than these amounts, unless this is your first job and you'll be on the new entrants minimum wage.
12.75 is a ridicolously low wage just the shopping for my family for one week costs 150+ a week and thats with carefull shopping rent for my house is 375$ and its not luxurious or large barely enough for a two children family thats more than i would earn in a week just for these two absolute necessities. Ridicolous.
I don't think you should quote stats using averages because averages are often easily skewed. Medians are more accurate. Consider the stats given by the Ministry of Statistics. It is highly unlikely that this government dept is independent. The numbers are obviously cooked to make NZ and the incumbent government's management of the economy look better than than what the truth would suggest. I'm willing to bet that that the median salary is nearly half of what the average NZ salary you have given. "How so?" you ask. Simply include all the unemployed, under-employed, the vast numbers on benefits, the working elderly, seasonal workers, temp workers, the many self-employed in marginal or businesses that draw only modest incomes and you'll get a very different picture.
Most people in this declining country are on less than $15/hr pre tax. If most people earned a decent income do you really think there would have been such an exodus to Australia over the past 3 decades? Do you really think used junksite TradeMe would be so popular? Where salaries are concerned, take Stats Dept figures with a big grain of salt.
The article was about minimum wages not average wage, but still some valid points there LL. Not sure why you think that unemployed should be included in median salary though.
Stats NZ report in June 2011 average weekly earnings were $1006.88 and median weekly earnings were $800.00 for wage and salary earners - about $20/hour.