Ensure workers have “fair and equitable remuneration”, combat underpaid work and contractual dumping, encourage the renewal of collective agreements. These are the principles envisaged by the majority’s amendment to the minimum wage law, which is actually completely upside down according to the structure designed by the opposition. Not only is every reference to the minimum threshold of 9 euros per hour deleted from the text, but according to M5S leader Giuseppe Conte, “the majority are reintroducing wage cages to break social cohesion”.
The former prime minister observed that on the centre-right change: “We are talking about differentiated wages according to the various regions of Italy, thus North and South. This is an unfortunate point of view that reintroduces the wage cages that we thought we had to overcome once and for all.” Is it really like this? Let’s try to understand this.
What are “salary cages”
To do this, we must first keep in mind what salary cages mean. This term refers to the system that was put into practice after an agreement signed between industrialists and unions in 1945, linking workers’ wages to the cost of living in different regions of the country. As a result, pay gaps between workers and employees performing the same tasks began to become very noticeable, reaching up to 20% of the salary, depending on the city. Following protests by workers and unions, the wage cage system was abolished in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
What does the government want to do?
The majority’s idea is to align part of the salary with the cost of living, without returning to a rigid system that was in place in the past. The amendment, submitted by center-right delegates, provides that the government must adopt one or more legislative provisions “relating to workers’ wages and collective bargaining” “within six months from the date of entry into force of this law”, adhering to certain “principles and guidelines”. Criteria”. According to our reading, these decrees should also provide “incentive instruments aimed at promoting the gradual development of second-level bargaining for adaptive purposes, as well as to cope with diversified needs arising from the increase in the cost of living and related to differences in costs on a regional basis”.
League offer
The passage we have quoted clearly recalls a proposal presented by the Union just a few days ago to adapt additional economic measures to the cost of living. “Without prejudice to the provisions contained in the national collective bargaining agreements in force,” we read in the text, “ancillary economic treatments may be defined in the regional areas where the company or operating unit is located” through second-level agreements.
All of this, as Lega senator Massimiliano Romeo explained, “provides tax credits for private employers to cover expenses incurred.” Therefore, second-level negotiations will be used to differentiate wages. In particular, action will be taken on “auxiliary economic treatments”, taking into account “the different impact that the increase in the costs of basic goods has on citizens, as can be seen from the Istat indices”. Essentially, the employer may be reimbursed by the government while the workers involved enjoy some additional benefits. In any case, this is an intervention that appears to have a much more limited scope than the reintroduction of “pay cages”.
The change in the text of the law on the minimum wage broadly reflects the Northern League’s proposal, but is still quite vague. Time will tell how it will be translated into law by the majority of the government.
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Source: Today IT
Roy Brown is a renowned economist and author at The Nation View. He has a deep understanding of the global economy and its intricacies. He writes about a wide range of economic topics, including monetary policy, fiscal policy, international trade, and labor markets.
