Christians have been at the heart of the campaign for the Real Living Wage since the movement began in 2001. Alongside other faith and community groups, Christian leaders in East London noticed that so many people in their communities were paid so little that they had to work two jobs just to get by. These workers had to choose between feeding their children and seeing them. They did not even have time to go to church or pray. Christians have objected to poverty wages ever since because these wages deny the inextinguishable dignity of each person; their faith drives them to campaign for wages sufficient for the means of life
The Real Living Wage is the minimum hourly pay rate someone needs to earn to be able to afford the means of life if they work full time. That’s £11.95 in London; £10.90 everywhere else. It’s calculated by the Resolution Foundation; a policy think tank that focuses on improving outcomes for people on low and modest incomes.
A campaign run by The Living Wage Foundation encourages employers to agree to pay all their workers this amount.
It is not to be confused with the so-called National Living Wage, which mandates by law that all workers 23 and older be paid £10.42 an hour.
Since we are all fundamentally equal, we all deserve the same dignity. This dignity involves allowing all to flourish in the ways a human being should.
Many Christians support the Real Living Wage because the Bible leads them to believe that every single human being shares the same fundamental dignity and value. As the story of creation says, everyone is made in ‘the image of God.’ Nothing is of greater value than God, so no thing in this world is more valuable than the image of God. Since we are all fundamentally equal, we all deserve the same dignity. This dignity involves allowing all to flourish in the ways a human being should, for example health, faith, family relationships and opportunities for children.
As each year passes, the way to safeguard the dignity of all in relation to work changes. Wages and working conditions change over time. When positive patterns emerge Christians praise and support them, but when insidious structures emerge, they challenge them. Safeguarding the inherent dignity of all human beings requires moral pragmatism. It demands that Christians always consider which changeable means can help attain the unchanging goal of human dignity. They see the Real Living Wage as a pragmatic way of safeguarding what the Bible teaches about human dignity, because poverty wages compromise it.
Poverty wages undermine workers’ ability to flouring in faith, health, family relationships, and opportunity for their children.
Voices of those on poverty wages reveal its damaging effects. In December 2022, a church in the heart of London’s financial district,, St Katherine Cree, hosted a carol service in English, Spanish and Portuguese. The intended congregation were not financiers but cleaners. Alongside singing carols and listening to bible readings, the service included testimonies from cleaners and their families, expressing their sense of life and faith. These testimonies exposed how poverty wages undermine workers’ ability to flouring in faith, health, family relationships, and opportunity for their children.
The root of the problem is that poverty wages cause severe overwork. Maritza, a one-time cleaner earning poverty wages and now a manager at Clean for Good, a cleaning company which pays the Real Living Wage, recalls:
"I went through a very difficult time in my life – having to bring up my children on my own, and earning so little money. I had to work such long hours."
Whilst Toyin, a community organiser and child of a cleaner earning below the living wage, speaks of how their mother ‘worked two jobs, seven days a week’ simply because her ‘job does not pay enough.’ Low paid workers often work incredibly long hours to earn enough to feed their children. These long hours and overwork then get in the way of these workers flourishing in other aspects of their life.
Such overwork compromises faith. Maritza explains that: “In this time of hardship, I lost my faith.” Toyin’s account expands on why Maritza and others have this experience.
“The people that I work with are affected because having more than one job does not allow them to find the time to go to church or even pray.”
For Christians, going to Church and praying underpin an individual’s faith. When poverty wages necessitate long and often unpredictable hours, they prevent people from exercising their religious belief and identity in these ways. Hence, one of the experiences of workers which led to the real living wage campaign was that overwork and Sunday working meant there was little time left for churchgoing or the other practices of faith. Aspects of life that having discretionary free times allows us to do.
Severe overwork damages the mental health of cleaners. Toyin suggests that an inability to spend time with family and practice their religious beliefs “has affected their mental health and well-being.” Research shows how widespread this phenomenon is. 69 per cent of below living wage workers report that their pay negatively affects their anxiety. Thus, poverty wages force conditions which damage workers’ health.
Under these conditions, workers find it difficult to make advance plans, even for events as important as their children’s birthday parties.
Conditions of poverty and overwork undermine family relationships. Maritza explains that,
‘‘I had to work such long hours that my children saw very little of me."
Toyin fleshes this point out.
"My mother was not paid a real living wage which meant I missed out on time with my mother which I resented as I didn’t understand her sacrifice at the time… The people that I work with are affected because having more than one job does not allow them to find the time to… provide the time, love and support to their families."
Cleaners often work such long hours at inconvenient times of the day that they are simply unable to see their children enough to nurture that relationship. To make matters worse, these hours are often highly unpredictable. 50 per cent of workers earning less than the real living wage receive less than a week’s notice for shifts, and 33 per cent have experienced unexpected cancellations. Under these conditions, workers find it difficult to make advance plans, even for events as important as their children’s birthday parties. It is no surprise, therefore, that 48 percent of workers earning less than the real living wage say that their wage has negatively affected their relationship with their children. Poverty wages force workers to choose between spending enough time with their children and having enough money to provide for them.
Poverty wages erode educational outcomes for children. Toyin explains that some parents find it harder to support children in their education.
"When I was younger, my mother worked two jobs, seven days a week which meant she was not able to help me with my schoolwork, come to school assemblies and other family needs."
Since parental support increases the child’s educational attainment, these children are left vulnerable to worse educational outcomes. Furthermore, it forces children into unofficial caring roles.
"There are also families where children have to care for their younger siblings, cook, clean and play the role of the parent due to their parent not being paid a living wage."
The pressures of this role distract from a child’s education and compromises their ability to reach their full potential. Poorer educational outcomes for children living in poverty is well documented. According to the National Education Union, ‘Children accessing Free School Meals are 8% less likely to leave school with 5 A*-C GCSE grades than their wealthier peers.’ A lack of parental support and the burden of caring responsibilities are likely a contributing factor.
Christians see how poverty wages compromise the inherent dignity of these workers by restricting their ability to flourish in faith, health, family relationships and opportunities for children. They also notice that these problems are widespread: the Resolution Foundation found in 2021 that about one in five jobs in the UK pay below the Real Living Wage. They believe that the Real Living Wage is the pragmatic way to safeguard the dignity of these workers, because it will take away the barriers to their flourishing. That is why Christians continue to campaign for the Real Living Wage, and why increasing numbers of Christian employers insist on paying fair wages. In this way, the belief that all are made in the image of God leads Christians pursue a world in which safeguards every person’s dignity and worth.
