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  3. Since a gigantic Sainsbury is my local corner shop, I have a purseful of thos

Since a gigantic Sainsbury is my local corner shop, I have a purseful of thos

游客2023-12-21  6
问题    Since a gigantic Sainsbury is my local corner shop, I have a purseful of those coupons: "Here’s ￡l. 45 off your next visit", etc. But lately I’ve felt 1 deserve another voucher: "Here’s a tax rebate on the cash you pay our low-paid workers so they can subsist. " The chances are they couldn’t get by without you. A survey of Sainsbury employees by Unite last year found that 60% relied upon government working tax credits to top up their salaries. Even so, in the previous six months, a third had resorted to borrowing money to settle their bills. Low pay is always seen as a leftie, bleeding-heart issue. Poor oppressed workers. Aux barricades! Rather it should raise the blood pressure of every taxpayer.
   The constant conniptions of supermarkets competing for market share, discounting their rivals, fighting off the German upstarts Aldi and Lidl, distract from the fact that they are vastly wealthy. Sainsbury’s underlying profits for 2012-13 were ￡758 million: these have trebled in a decade. Who could begrudge Sainsbury’s new CEO Mike Coupe his ￡900,000 basic salary, if only he paid all his 157,000 retail staff enough to live on without you and me chipping in? But he doesn’t and, bizarrely, no one is inclined to make him.
   Voters abhor a high welfare bill or the notion that benefits arc rising faster than wages. But if the chancellor wanted to take ￡300 a year from every low-paid household, ￡490 from families with children, could he not at least have added: "I call upon our friends in business to make up the difference: to help cut the welfare bill, by paying all their employees a living wage. " Because the problem is not just soaring welfare but stagnating wages. For the first time in British history, the majority of those classified in poverty already have jobs. In the last decade, food bills have increased by 44% , energy costs more than doubled, but even now that the economy has rallied, wages have barely picked up. Now 5. 2 million of the workforce are paid below a rate at which decent life is sustainable. And since, without government support, families on minimum wage would barely be able to feed their children, in-work benefits cost taxpayers ￡28 billion a year.
   During the Tory and Labour conferences, much was said about "political disconnect" —the angry distrust voters feel towards the major Westminster parties. It was ascribed to ideological differences on Europe. But deep down, it’s about money, stupid. Life is a trudge and people see no one capable of lightening their step. The idea that prosperity should be shared, increased productivity linked to wages, fell apart in the 1980s. As Warren Buffett said recently, the class war was won "by my class, the rich class". Employees know that even low-paid jobs are precious, that if they contemplate something as audaciously retro as striking, a pool of labour could rush to take their place.
   Companies relish their upper hand, play the austerity card during pay rounds even now times are better. When the retailer Next was asked why, despite record profits, its wages were still below the living wage, it replied that since 30 people applied for every job advertised, how could it be paying too little? While the executive googles ski-breaks in Verbier, the cleaner emptying his bin walks to work to save on bus fares. The low-paid don’t merely have less stuff: they have less stable relationships and weaker health. Are their struggles invisible to those who pay their terrible salaries, or do they not care?
   I was encouraged to read in the report by the Living Wage Commission that not all lack heart. Sir John Bond, then chairman of HSBC, was moved by a speech from a Canary Wharf cleaner. Both then introduced the living wage. Indeed Guy Stallard of KPMG, whose company has paid it since 2006, says staff turnover is lower and morale up. Give people the means to be fully human and they will be loyal. Now eight companies on the FTSE 100 index pay the living wage. But in retail, which has the biggest proportion of low-paid workers, not a single high street name has signed up. These days our only political muscle is as consumers, choosing Fairtrade, making ethical investments. And there would be great kudos for the first of the big four supermarkets who stopped sitting on its mega-profits while adding staff wage bills to the welfare tab. [br] What is the argument of the retailer Next?
选项 A、As too many people applied for every job advertised, the pay could not be low.
B、Record profits have already shown that workers got their living wage.
C、If fewer people apply for jobs advertised, then they will consider raising salaries.
D、The retailer has to play the austerity card even in better time.
答案 A
解析
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