- The National Living Wage, announced in the 2015 Autumn Statement and effective from 1 April 2016, effectively takes control of the Minimum Wage out of the hands of the Low Pay Commission and gives it to the government.
- Whereas the LPC had a mandate to balance both pay and employment concerns, free from political pressure, the issue is now politicised.
- There are worries that abandoning this framework will threaten employment: the Office for Budget Responsibility projected last year that 60,000 fewer jobs will be created under this regime than the previous status quo.
- This paper reviews the empirical evidence on the direct and indirect impacts of increases to the Minimum Wage.
Read the whole paper here.
