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Unemployment and Minimum Wages in Australia, 1900–1930

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Colin Forster
Colin Forster
Affiliation:
The author is Reader in Economic History, Australian National University, Camberra ACT 2601, Australia.
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Abstract

The paper focuses on the development in Australia of minimum wage-setting and its relationship to unemployment. A variety of industrial tribunals embarked on a course of wage-setting early in the twentieth century as part of their task of reducing industrial conflict. In varying degree, the tribunals kept in mind what was thought of as wage justice for workers with low bargaining power. By 1921 a standard minimum wage for unskilled men had emerged and formed the basis of the wage system. It was a wage which had a strong welfare basis. Other wages more closely reflected the market. During the 1920s unemployment was not high but was concentrated on less-capable unskilled men. The limited evidence available points to the wage structure as the main cause.

Type
Papers Presented at the Forty-fourth Annual Meeting of the Economic History Association
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 45 , Issue 2 , June 1985 , pp. 383 - 388
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1985

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References

1 Higgins, Henry Bournes, A New Province for Law and Order (Constable, 1922), p. 143.Google Scholar

2 Reprinted in Higgins, Henry Bournes, A New Province for Law and Order (Constable, 1922)., pp. 96–97.Google Scholar

3 This ratio is a reminder of the height of the basic wage; for example, in 1921/22 the basic wage was about 84 percent of average weekly earnings of adult male wage and salary earners in factories.Google Scholar

4 Forster, C., “Australian Unemployment, 1900–1940”, Economic Record, 41 (09.1965).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 In both years, however, trade union returns are close to the census figures. For example, in 1921 the percentage of trade unionists reported as unemployed in February was 11.4, and in May, 12.5. The number unemployed at the census in April amounted to 9.6 percent of employees.Google Scholar

6 The numbers unemployed are usually compared with numbers of employees. In fact some unemployed could be self-employed.Google Scholar

7 Royal Commission on National Insurance, Second Progress Report: Unemployment (Parliamentary Papers, 1926–1928, vol. 4). The main part of the evidence is in the Minutes of Evidence; the Commission heard evidence over the period from October 1924 to June 1926.Google Scholar