When is a Nine Day Fortnight only 8 and a bit days long?

March 13, 2009 by
Filed under: Jobs & Work, Retirement, Pensions and Kiwisaver 

Details of the suggested 9-day Fortnights are now coming together, and surprise, surprise, the New Zealand worker doesn’t come out of the deal at all well.

Bang goes the 1 day training you are supposed to do in lieu of working for your company.
Bang goes getting paid much at all for your forced “day off”.

Instead the deal is:

You take off up to 10 hours a fortnight (so more than a day), and the government will pay you minimum wage ($12.50 an hour before tax) for HALF of it. Yay!

Your company may make up the difference. Hmmm.

So if you actually work an 8-hour day, you will get $50 a fortnight (before tax) for losing a days pay. How many people do you know who could cope with that???

There just are not that many people who regularly spend less than they earn, and will be able to manage earning even less. I know we couldn’t do it – not because we spend too much – but we can’t lose 10% of our pay and get $50 back for the privilege.

I don’t know if I’m just being a bit thick here – but I can’t see how this is going to help people. Will it actually save jobs? And what I want to know most is: what safeguards are there going to be put in place to stop companies entering this scheme, cutting their staffs pay by 10%, when they are still making a profit???

Here’s and interesting story:

Hubby was made redundant by Unisys a few years ago. At the time, Unisys has a recorded profit of just $1m (New Zealand Dollars). By making hubby redundant and saving his salary – Unisys effectively increased their profit by 10%. How many Fisher & Paykel factory workers would have to be laid off (or have salaries cut by 10%) in order for F&P to increase their $29m profit by 10%.

Something to think about???

Related posts:

  1. A Nine-Day Fortnight for New Zealand?
  2. The Coffee and Cake Jobs Summit.
  3. Why is it that Employers and the Tax Payer have to save the economy?
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Comments

One Comment on When is a Nine Day Fortnight only 8 and a bit days long?

  1. DIY Projects » Blog Archive » 9 Day Fortnights Just For Union Members? « Homepaddock on Wed, 18th Mar 2009 11:51 am

    2. [...] When is a Nine Day Fortnight only 8 and a bit days long … [...]

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