Sniggid, you under-estimate Howard. The adverse effects on battlers will be slow and gradual and will affect less than 10 per cent of the workforce. These are people who usually vote Labor anyway and in any case many of them are hysterical about the terrorist threat. So, alas, Howard is safe: he will hit the most vulnerable in the community and
get away with it politically, Freddy

Sniggid,

What are you being paid by the Liberal Party at present? I'm sure you won't be afffected by the proposed IR "reforms".

Reforms won't help productivity?

It is one thing to say that some lesser skilled people will miss out with the proposed IR reforms because the minimum wage will (quite rightly) eventually drop. However I am rather amazed by this argument put by many people that productivity will over time decrease because of the disincentive of lower wages. What about the situation now where management often would like to get rid of certain unpunctual /belligerent/ lazy/ sloppy workers but affordably can’t? How can this NOT effect productivity?

What these proposed reforms will do is spread the gap of wages between the competent and the incompetent. With the employer’s same wage bill, he /she can now pay more to the highly efficient, pay the same to the mediocre, pay less to the barely competent but sincere, and pay nothing to the erstwhile incompetent or sullen and disruptive workers on the factory floor that were previously too expensive or administratively difficult to fire. Because the carrot and stick incentive to get on with your workmates and do a good job would always be there, productivity would increase in leaps and bounds.

Edward Carson,
Your assertion that employers will spread wages on ascending scales commensurate with competency to paraphrase your last paragraph is an exercise in fantasy.
I am reminded of a 1967 survey by the North Australian Workers Union, of cattle stations across the Northern Territory to check the wages paid to Aboriginal stockmen one year after the Arbitration Commissions decision that Aboriginal Stockmen be paid equal wages from a delayed commencement date.
The Pastoralists advocate claimed that some were not competent but gave the Union to understand they would increase the wages of those workers who were.
The survey visited a wide cross section of properties and not one single Aboriginal Stockman was being paid the full Award wage.
The refusal to pay full award precipitated the Wave Hill Walk -Off of the Gurindji people.
The Howard Government's IR legislation will ensure that low paid unskilled jobs will experience difficulty in finding workers .
Without regulation of decent wages and conditions,Howards scheme will create more problems that it solves.

One thing many people fail to take into account in their analysis of reward for effort in the workplace, is the total amount of energy in the system. In the past/present there certainly were/are many people who did/do not get properly compensated for their work . But, in my opinion, this has more to do with the deadening effect of the majority who didn't really want to be industrious that dragged down those around them. Whatever you think about Howard's politics, he has plenty of energy and he wants to transform the entire economic system, so that those who can offer more in the workplace are rewarded more. On this conceptual level I think he's on solid ground.

The other thing is that as (above-average) standards fall, the amount of opportunities for people who have traditionally missed out in the past increase. For example, while Qantas is reducing its costs in order to stay competitive, the "equity" locked up in its current arrangements (including what it pays its workers) is being redistributed in a wider and flatter form, with the result that opportunities are being created for more people. While the vested interests in the unions complain, more ordinary people are slowly and silently benefiting. At least this is one significant positive in Howard's agenda.

RobP,
Surely you are aware that Award wages are Minimum wages......
There has NEVER been a restriction on Employers rewarding performance by paying OVER the award