{"id":14270,"date":"2018-01-04T14:59:22","date_gmt":"2018-01-04T14:59:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=14270"},"modified":"2018-01-04T16:55:11","modified_gmt":"2018-01-04T16:55:11","slug":"fat-cat-thursday-top-bosses-earn-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=14270","title":{"rendered":"Fat Cat Thursday"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On the third working day of the year, spare a moment to think of Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fat cats<\/a>, who have now earned more than the annual salary of an average UK worker.<\/p>\n

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Today (January 4) is \u00e2\u20ac\u015bFat Cat Thursday\u00e2\u20ac\u0165, the day when the income of the country\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s top bosses surpasses \u00c2\u014128,758 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c an amount that takes most people a full year to earn.<\/p>\n

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Unite said the figure shows that the excesses of Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s boardrooms are alive and well, despite Theresa May\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s tough talk to crack down on \u00e2\u20ac\u015bcorporate greed\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

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The mean yearly pay of chief executives in FTSE 100 firms was \u00c2\u01414.5m in 2017, according to the joint analysis<\/a> by the High Pay Centre and the Chartered Institute for Personnel Development.<\/p>\n

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That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a whopping 120 times more than an average full-time employee earns over the same period.<\/p>\n

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Unite assistant general secretary Steve Turner said the pay disparity between top executives and typical workers is \u00e2\u20ac\u015bscandalous\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 and shows the government has done nothing to curb damaging corporate excess.<\/p>\n

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He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bTheresa May talks tough about \u00e2\u20ac\u0098burning injustices<\/a>\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 and \u00e2\u20ac\u0098corporate greed\u00e2\u20ac\u2122, but does little to nothing about tackling them, which begs the question of whose side she is on?\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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Turner pointed to high levels of wage inequality and unfair and insecure work and demanded action to rein in executive pay and \u00e2\u20ac\u015bintroduce fairness and transparency into Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s workplaces\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

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As well as including worker representatives on boards, Turner called for a clamp down on exploitative work practises \u00e2\u20ac\u201c such as bogus self-employment and zero hour contracts \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and the strengthening of trade union rights to organise and bargain for better wages on behalf of workers.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThese grossly excessive and unjustifiable gaps between the fat cats at the top and the rest of the workforce do nothing for morale in the workplace and need to end,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Turner said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIf Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s boardrooms want workers to help make them profits, it is high time they paid them fairly and started acting responsibly. If they won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t, then the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s duty is to force them to do so.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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Unite also criticised a new report<\/a> from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), which claims that rising wages will lead employers to cut jobs and invest in automation.<\/p>\n

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According to the big business friendly report, which Unite dismissed as \u00e2\u20ac\u015bpropaganda for bad employers\u00e2\u20ac\u0165, increasing the minimum wage could encourage firms to replace workers with machines that don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to be paid.<\/p>\n

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The TUC also slammed the report, saying minimum wage<\/a> rises have gone \u00e2\u20ac\u015bhand-in-hand\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 with increased employment.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Congress called for a \u00c2\u014110 minimum wage, along with investment in training and infrastructure, to produce a modern economy that works for everyone.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015b(The IFS report) is just propaganda for bad employers who want an excuse to suppress wages,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Unite executive officer Sharon Graham said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

“I don’t suppose that economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies are asking for pay cuts to protect themselves from robots,” she added. “They know that \u00e2\u20ac\u0098Industry 4.0\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 is going to generate enormous amounts of wealth and we need automaton to deliver for society not just bigger profits. Why not demand a shorter working week and a decent retirement?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe IFS seems to think that it should be just like the 1980’s. Then we lost jobs and wages to technology while boardrooms profited. But this time workers can and should get their share. Of course, the best way to defend your job and get the most out of automation is also the best way to keep your pay above the minimum wage – get organised in a union.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the third working day of the year, spare a moment to think of Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fat cats, who have now earned more than the annual salary of an average UK worker.   Today (January 4) is \u00e2\u20ac\u015bFat Cat Thursday\u00e2\u20ac\u0165, the day when the income of the country\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s top bosses surpasses \u00c2\u014128,758 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c an amount that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":827,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[331,643,102,215],"wps_subtitle":"Today top bosses earn more than what most make in a year","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14270"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14270"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14270\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14271,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14270\/revisions\/14271"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}