Budget 2017: Meddling with wages would be a mistake - employers

Fixing income inequality by meddling with the labour market or intervening with the wage determination mechanism would be a "knee-jerk reaction" and a mistake, employers have said.  "Some countries in the EU have higher wages than Malta, but they also have higher unemployment," the Malta Employers' Association has argued in its pre-2017 budget proposals, saying that Malta had managed to weather the global financial crisis thanks to a strategy of "wage moderation and responsible employment practices and job creation by the private sector."  The MEA wants the government to encourage policies that minimise the number of persons on low wages, "rather than raising wages artificially." Its proposals call for vulnerable groups such as pensioners and single-parent families to be helped through focused social interventions. In its proposals, the MEA noted that the local economy was doing well, with GDP up, employment down and the labour activity rate increasing.  But it warned that while things were going well, there were several factors which suggested things might not remain so cushy in the future.  Among those, the MEA said, was the likelihood of Malta no longer receiving EU...

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