I see the unions have won their battle to lower the adult wage, from 21 to 20.

Now of cause, to them, that's just the beginning, as they want that lowered even more to 18, a move that will see the collapse of so many industry youth jobs, who either rely on older juniors, or hire the likes of school based apprentices.

As if we don't already have a rising youth unemployment problem, these union dills simply try to put out a fire by adding petrol.

Oh what fools they are.

Dear Rehctub,

Do you really believe that when the price of labour
goes up employers hire less?

Also I wasn't sure that this case was finalised yet.

Anyway, if an 18 year old is doing the same work
why shouldn't that be reflected in the wages?

18 year olds can after all -

1) Vote.
2) Enter into legal contracts.
3) get married without parental consent.

Why should they get paid any less for doing the same work.

Foxy my sweet, Employees are only worth a percentage of what they can earn an employer. With all the overheads in business, they need earn their keep. Unfortunately most juniors earn far less than they cost.

You know yourself, if you think about it, the value of a junior library assistant. Would a good one be worth a tenth of an experienced librarian? I really doubt it, but the very best just may.

Does this mean they should be paid less than a tenth that of a librarian? Of course it does, but they are paid much more than that.

If your library was a business, the owner would have to earn much more from his experienced staff to be able to cover the cost of the unproductive juniors he was training. He trains people in the hope that they will become productive in time.

Even experienced people are often unproductive in a new job. In the last company I ran, I used to put new office staff through at least 2 months of assembly & stores work. Without this most unproductive time, they never became conversant with product codes, & how they worked. Without this knowledge they were never competent employees.

I reckoned it took 12 months minimum for a new employee to start to contribute to the bottom line, & many never did, the reason that unfair dismissal laws are such a hindrance to growing businesses & hiring people. They make it too hard to get rid of the dead heads, those who never lived up to their potential, or your hopes for them.

Foxy, I have no problem with a younger worker being paid a full wage, but, forcing this upon the employer is where the problem lies.

Also, you take a kid who starts work for an employer at say 17. In a few years, that same person needs to be paid a full wage and, if the boss decides to let them go, then the boss has at the very least a please explain, or worse, an unfair dismissal case on their hands.

Now I have no real issue with the lowering of the limit from 21 to 20, as is the case, but, this is just the beginning as the unions will keep pushing now, and I can assure you that the result will not be pretty because like it or not, bosses go in to business to make money and, any potential conflicts that may arise, often means they will just avoid the issue.

Another problem is lack of experience, as a person at 25 usually has more experience than one of 18, but, if an employer has to choose between both, they will often take the older of the two, as there is a better chance they wont be so dedicated to Facebook and they cost the same.

Finally, many young guys start to mature at 25 and begin their quest to become a father themselves and, along with this change in attitude, also comes commitment, something that most 18 year olds lack, and that's a simple fact. So lowering that age limit will see less 18 year olds getting that crucial start.

Having been an employer most of my life, this is one topic I do know a lot about ad, as is usually the case, I hope I can be proven wrong, but I doubt it.

18 year olds can after all -

1) Vote.
2) Enter into legal contracts.
3) get married without parental consent.

Foxy,
Trust you to latch onto a immense wrongs such as these to support an argument.
Of course there will be many more unemployed now. This is nothing but an undermining of the Coalition's efforts to reduce the youth unemployment rate by the ALP foul heads Department.

Hasbeen has implied that a librarian deserves a higher
salary than a library assistant. Yet, I've found (and
numerous studies have shown) that there is little or
no relationship between educational achievement and
job performance or productivity. For example, good
grades in a graduate school of medicine or education,
are poor predictors of whether someone will become a
good doctor or teacher (or even librarian).

The fact is that the skills required to get an A grade or
higher in a college course on anatomy or educational
philosophy or library management are not the same as the
skills needed to deal with a medical emergency, or an
unruly junior high school class, or managing a library.
Most people pick up the necessary skiils on the job,
not in the classroom and the characteristics that make
for a successful career (such as initiative, leadership,
drive, negotiating ability, willingness to take risks,
and persuasiveness) are not even taught in
the colleges. It seems that colleges produce graduates with
any number of educational credentials but few specifically
job-related skills.

In fact, millions of people never put the specific content
of their college education to direct use in their jobs,
and nearly half of the country's college graduates
actually work in fields they consider unrelated to their
major subjects.

Of course on the whole, however, a higher credential has
meant higher earnings, simply because of the value the job
markets places on it.

From my own experience - I've had a colleague
(librarian) take over for
me several times - in running a few of my Storytime Sessions
for pre-schoolers. I've also asked a young library-assistant
to do some of the sessions on a few occassions. I found
that the young library-assistant was far more capable,
personable, and did the job much better. She inter-acted with
the children in ways that were imaginative and fun. The
librarian was ok. But given a choice I would have given the
job to the younger library-assistant, who did it far better.