IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iae/iaewps/wp2007n08.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Who Are the Low Waged?

Author

Listed:
  • Seamus McGuinness

    (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne)

  • John Freebairn

    (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne)

Abstract

This paper provides pictures of low pay adult employees in Australia in 2004 drawing on data from the HILDA survey. The low waged are disaggregated into full-time and part-time employees. It is conservatively estimated that approximately 13 per cent of employees can be classified as low waged with just under 5 per cent assessed to have earned below the federal minimum wage in 2004. Estimates from multivariate probit models reveal that low wage employees are more likely to have casual status, single marital status, a low educational attainment, aged 21 to 30 or 60 plus, be employed in small firms, non-unionised and have lower occupational tenure. The magnitude of effect of these distinguishing characteristics is much larger for part-time versus full-time employees. Low waged employees, and more so in the case of full-time employees, are spread fairly evenly across households with different incomes, however, some differences are apparent when the data are disaggregated by employment status. For about a half of low waged employees, a low waged job, especially if it is full-time, is a stepping stone to higher paying jobs in the future. However for a sizeable proportion of low waged part-time employees, low pay is either a continuing state or a precursor for movement into labour market inactivity.

Suggested Citation

  • Seamus McGuinness & John Freebairn, 2007. "Who Are the Low Waged?," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2007n08, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    • Handle: RePEc:iae:iaewps:wp2007n08
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://melbourneinstitute.unimelb.edu.au/downloads/working_paper_series/wp2007n08.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mark B. Stewart, 2004. "The Impact of the Introduction of the U.K. Minimum Wage on the Employment Probabilities of Low-Wage Workers," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 2(1), pages 67-97, March.
    2. Drago, Robert & Black, David & Wooden, Mark, 2004. "Female Breadwinner Families: Their Existence, Persistence and Sources," IZA Discussion Papers 1308, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Robson, Doug & Rodgers, Joan R, 2008. "Travail to No Avail? Working Poverty in Australia," Economics Working Papers wp08-08, School of Economics, University of Wollongong, NSW, Australia.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kyota Eguchi, 2010. "Minimum Wages and Trainers' Dilemma," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 24(2), pages 128-138, June.
    2. Bonin Holger & Isphording Ingo E. & Krause-Pilatus Annabelle & Lichter Andreas & Pestel Nico & Rinne Ulf, 2020. "The German Statutory Minimum Wage and Its Effects on Regional Employment and Unemployment," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 240(2-3), pages 295-319, April.
    3. Roy E. Bailey & Timothy J. Hatton & Kris Inwood, 2016. "Atmospheric Pollution and Child Health in Late Nineteenth Century Britain," CEH Discussion Papers 052, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    4. Alessandro Cigno, 2011. "The Economics of Marriage," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 12(s1), pages 28-41, May.
    5. Möller, Joachim & König, Marion, 2012. "The Effects of Minimum Wages in the German Construction Sector - Reconsidering the Evidence," VfS Annual Conference 2012 (Goettingen): New Approaches and Challenges for the Labor Market of the 21st Century 62064, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    6. Stewart, Mark B., 2011. "Quantile estimates of counterfactual distribution shifts and the impact of minimum wage increases on the wage distribution," Economic Research Papers 270766, University of Warwick - Department of Economics.
    7. Marchingiglio, Riccardo & Poyker, Mikhail, 2024. "The Economics of Gender-Specific Minimum Wage Legislation," IZA Discussion Papers 17016, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Andrew Benito & Jumana Saleheen, 2013. "Labour Supply as a Buffer: Evidence from UK Households," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 80(320), pages 698-720, October.
    9. David Wilkinson & Rebecca Riley, 2011. "The UK Minimum Wage at Age 22: A Regression Discontinuity Approach," National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) Discussion Papers 378, National Institute of Economic and Social Research.
    10. Kate Rybczynski & Anindya Sen, 2018. "Employment Effects Of The Minimum Wage: Panel Data Evidence From Canadian Provinces," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(1), pages 116-135, January.
    11. Francesco Porcelli, 2014. "Electoral accountability and local government efficiency: quasi-experimental evidence from the Italian health care sector reforms," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 221-251, August.
    12. Marco Francesconi & Holly Sutherland & Francesca Zantomio, 2011. "A comparison of earnings measures from longitudinal and cross‐sectional surveys: evidence from the UK," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 174(2), pages 297-326, April.
    13. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/9665 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Peter Dolton & Chiara Rosazza Bondibene & Jonathan Wadsworth, 2012. "Employment, Inequality and the UK National Minimum Wage over the Medium‐Term," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 74(1), pages 78-106, February.
    15. Pestel, Nico & Bonin, Holger & Isphording, Ingo E. & Gregory, Terry & Caliendo, Marco, 2020. "Auswirkungen des gesetzlichen Mindestlohns auf Beschäftigung und Arbeitslosigkeit," IZA Research Reports 95, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Mirko Draca & Stephen Machin & John Van Reenen, 2011. "Minimum Wages and Firm Profitability," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(1), pages 129-151, January.
    17. Andreas Georgiadis & Ioannis Kaplanis & Vassilis Monastiriotis, 2018. "Greece after the Bailouts: The Impact of Minimum Wages on Wages and Employment: Evidence from Greece," GreeSE – Hellenic Observatory Papers on Greece and Southeast Europe 131, Hellenic Observatory, LSE.
    18. Filiz Gülal & Adam Ayaita, 2020. "The Impact of Minimum Wages on Well-Being: Evidence from a Quasi-experiment in Germany," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 21(7), pages 2669-2692, October.
    19. Sharimakin A. & Oseni M.S. & Adegboye A.C., 2015. "Education, labour productivity and income inequality in Nigeria," Annals of the University of Petrosani, Economics, University of Petrosani, Romania, vol. 15(1), pages 295-306.
    20. Joachim Möller, 2012. "Minimum wages in German industries—what does the evidence tell us so far? [Branchenspezifische Mindestlöhne in Deutschland – Was sagt uns die empirische Forschung?]," Journal for Labour Market Research, Springer;Institute for Employment Research/ Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), vol. 45(3), pages 187-199, December.
    21. Joanna K. Swaffield, 2014. "Minimum Wage Hikes And The Wage Growth Of Low-Wage Workers," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(4), pages 384-405, October.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iae:iaewps:wp2007n08. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sheri Carnegie (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/mimelau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.