SIR – Surprise, surprise, your correspondent Mr D S Boyes blames the last Labour government, for the “UK’s low-wage economy” (T&A, September 15), conveniently forgetting that it was membership of the EU, where free movement of labour, materials and capital over borders has the effect of equalising their prices among member states, that has reduced wages in the UK.

Labour is just another commodity to be bought and sold, its price determined by supply-and-demand factors. Erosion of the minimum or “living” wage is due to pressure from an increasing EU labour market pushing down the price of labour in the UK and decreased demand for it as more commodities, once manufactured in the UK, are sourced from abroad. (Now, DSB’s printing presses are made in the Third World more cheaply than those once made in Leeds).

But, if DSB likes conundrums, try the “Beer/Wage” game. At 7d a pint in 1964 and based on a 40-hour week of 10s per hour, DSB’s wage would buy 686 pints of bitter. To buy these today at £3 per pint, his weekly wage would have to be just over £2,000. Now that’s a living wage even MPs could manage on.

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