- According to the Economic Survey 2019,India needs to have a mandatory national-level minimum wage to promote social justice and curb distress migration.
- At present,minimum wages are fixed on the basis of the skill level, geographical areas,nature of work.This has led to a proliferation of minimum wages making enforcement a challenging task.
- The Survey’s recommendations are in line with the revised wage code bill which says fixing minimum wages based on either the level of skill or the geographical region or both.
- This simplification in the structure is expected to bring down the number of minimum wages to 300 from about 2,500 wage rates that exist today.
- Under this architecture,the Centre would notify a national floor minimum wage that could vary across the five geographical regions identified in the survey.This would serve as a floor wage.States have the option of fixing the wages at higher levels.
- Further,these wages would be regularly adjusted presumably by the state-wise consumer price index for industrial workers.The wage should also be extended to all sectors of the economy covering both the formal and the informal sector.
