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OVER 10% OF Irish workers are being paid the equivalent of, or less than, the national minimum wage of €9.25 per hour.
The statistic is contained in the latest release from the Quarterly National Household Survey, published by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
For the nine months between April and December 2016 10.1% of employees, or one in ten, earned less than or the equivalent of the statutory minimum wage of €9.25.
The minimum wage was increased per the last budget in January 2017 from €9.15.
The figure of 10.1% translates to 22,500 employees who self-reported earnings as being less than the minimum wage and 132,600 who said they were paid the exact figure.
Of that 22,500, 5,700 reported that the reason they earned less than the minimum wage was the fact they were on a special training rate, while a further 5,800 said they were on an age-related rate.
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Women, meanwhile, are more likely to earn the minimum wage or less.
84,400, or 54.4% of the 155,100 people earning that wage were women.
This compares to the overall split of employees in the State – 49.4% male versus 50.6% female.
The minimum wage is predominant in Ireland’s services industry, with four in five (81.7%) of the employees being paid the wage or less coming from that sector.
The majority of those being paid at or less than the minimum wage from this sector come from two specific industries – the repair of motor vehicles or motorcycles (accounting for 25.9% of all employees earning €9.25 or less), and the accommodation and food services sector (24.7%).
The lion’s share, 37.9%, of all those earning the minimum wage or less came from the 18-24 age group. Almost three in five of those on the lower wage or less were employed part-time.
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Non-Irish nationals are more likely to Irish natives to earn the minimum wage or less. 28.2% of all employees on the minimum wage or less were non-Irish, which equates to nearly one fifth of all non-Irish employees across the board.
The greatest proportion of those working for the minimum wage or less had a lower level of education. 19.4% of all employees whose highest level of education was primary school, or less, self-reported as being paid that wage.
16.7% of those on the wage or less had completed higher secondary education, while 18.8% had not progressed beyond lower secondary. Just 3.4% of those with a third level degree were on the minimum wage or less.
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Yes James, we all blindly believe you! You couldn’t just discuss that one site with Nama, as it would be too obvious. So you threw another few in, to throw a wall of Fog up around it. We aren’t stupid, you lying two faced Facist blueshirt!
Facist Blueshirt…. !!! Nice comment…Thats says a lot about you..
I wonder which party you are involved in Stephen…Had a glance at your tweets btw…nice use of english..
This smells like Minister Michael Lowry’s type of decision making all over again. This certainly should warrant his dismissal.
Correct.
Has he decided that the new children’s hospital would be perfect for Swords or Balbriggan yet?
He looks like a crook in the photo.
Oh wait ..
Yea ………. Along with all his colleagues
Fat Tony from The Simpsons. Except that cartoon is more believable than this government,
fat tony yea who is mr burns?
Pat Carey is Mr. Burns.
Only he’s got an airport already he’d want one of those as well. Taxi for Dr Reilly.
Anyone wonder why Angela Merkel calls Enda Kenny Smithers.
was that really worth saying?? what have you added apart from another cheap shot… These forums are a pathetc joke
…and yet you still come back for more Declan !
O’Reilly from Fawlty Towers was more trustworthy than this guy.
Squire Hockey must be looking down (or up) and wondering when it was exactly that the Blueshirts usurped Fenian Failure’s mantle as the country’s arbiters of clientism and corruption. Plus ca change and all that….
As Reilly committed the same offence as Sean Quinn’s son, ie. failure to comply with a court directive, at that time he should have been sitting in a cell with Quinn and not sitting down with NAMA.
Jack Kiernan
He’s still in a job because he’s not entitled to his minsters pension yet. As soon as he is, shortly afterwards he’ll be moved aside.
A payback from Enda for the support in the great heavy ho.
Don’t forget FG Have been out of office for a while, it’s a long time since they clocked up a massive pension fund for some of the faithful
O’Reilly has more baggage than a RyanAir flight to Malaga. How he is still in a job is just another example of this shambollic government.
It’s blindingly obvious what O’Reilly was trying to do! The guy has been caught out doing a Fianna FAILure on it and playing gombeen politics for his own electoral benefit. The man is a disgrace and should have been sacked. It say all you need to know about the current shower in power that they all backed him up, nothing ever changes, the same abuses we saw under the last shower just carry on as usual with this bunch of chancers. Bottom line, they are all as crooked and bent as each other, don’t be surprised if the new children’s hospital isn’t moved to a location in a marginal FG constituency or worse to Mayo!
Corrupt to the bone!!
In response, Gilmore said: “In relation to individual ministers and who they meet and what’s in their diary and when: to be honest, I can’t track, nor do I want to track, the diaries of every minister in this Government and who they met and when they met and so on… nor indeed could I possibly do so.”
Why not? Why isnt it possible for this to be done? In this particular case, surely all the available evidence SHOULD be looked at? And if Gilmore doesnt do it himself, why don’t others, mandated by him, do it on his behalf? Wouldn’t this fall into the category of ‘transparency and accountability’ that he is so fond of banging on about (when he is taking a break from running Ireland and Europe)
Whats exactly does this change?? A waste of question by SF?? So what if he met with NAMA…If we can use a property that the state already owns for a primary care site then great??? I fail to see anything in this….Why are you even bothering to write it up??? Most be a real slow news day!!!
What does it change? He said he had no hand in selection of sites. This suggests otherwise. Also, you do know that lobbying NAMA is illegal? And how is it a waste of a question? TD’s can ask as many written questions as they like. You’re not a FG supporter by any chance??
@Declan your obviously a FG fan so your comments dont hold much because……….
It is a pity that Roscommon Co Council did not have your attitude Declan , and use already built office space ,instead of squandering €18,000,000 that they have to borrow ! For shame !
Would not believe a word out of his mouth
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