[Dion]

A Vote for the UCP Is a Vote for Wage Suppression

In a study prepared by economist Jim Stanford and released jointly this week by the Alberta Federation of Labour and the Centre for Future Work, we show that Alberta’s record on wage growth under the UCP has been the worst among all Canadian provinces.

That’s right: despite the fact that Alberta is the wealthiest province in the country, when it comes to wage growth, we’re dead last.

Over the past four years, weekly wages in Alberta grew by an average of 2.3 per cent annually, far below the Canadian average of 3.9 per cent.

The wages earned by many other Canadians are falling behind inflation, too. But, here in Alberta, workers are falling behind faster than anywhere else. In fact, if the current trends persist, Alberta may soon lose its position as Canada’s highest-wage province to places like B.C., Ontario or Quebec.

It’s important for Alberta voters to understand that this is no accident. Instead, it’s the result of what can only be described as a deliberate wage suppression strategy implemented by the UCP over the past four years.

First, the UCP has frozen the minimum wage — and cut it by $2 for workers under the age of 18.

While other provinces increased their minimum wage rates by an average of 26 per cent over the past four years, under the UCP Alberta’s minimum wage remained the same, even as inflation spiked.

If the Alberta minimum wage had kept up with inflation, it would be $17 today, instead of $15.

Alberta workers understand that failing to increase wages to match inflation is the same thing as a wage cut. So, essentially, the UCP has cut the wages of our province’s lowest paid workers by $2 per hour (and by $4 for teenagers).

The second thing the UCP did to reduce wages for Albertans was to make it harder for workers to join unions and easier for Alberta employers to bust existing unions.

Under the UCP, workers now have to go through a much longer and more complicated process to join a union.

The UCP has also refused to abolish the practice of “double-breasting,” which allows employers in the construction sector to spin off new non-union arms whenever a group of workers is successful in organizing a union.

They have also refused to stop employers from “contract flipping” — a process currently being used by Imperial Oil to replace a unionized work-camp contractor with a non-union contractor, which will pay its workers 17 per cent less.

You don’t have to be a fan of unions to understand that these kinds of attacks on workplace rights undermine worker bargaining power — and weakened worker bargaining power means lower wages for all workers, not just union members.

https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2023/05/2...e-Suppression/