Fair Wage

18 July 2011

Romans 4:4 Now to one who works, his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due.

A Christian principle is that if you do not work you do not eat, in the same way each person that does work needs to be able to produce enough to provide for the needs of the family. A home, food and clothing, whether the worker is self employed or not is the basic need of all of mankind. In the world today the driving force behind industry are the financiers who invest in business in order to make a profit, so if a business does not produce dividends then the funding is withdrawn and the business is bankrupt. The people working are no longer seen as individuals with families but rather a component in order to ensure productivity and thus profit.

Jesus made the point that  workers deserves their wages, and that profiteering on the work of others is evil. The use of interest or usury is the source of this evil and was forbidden in all Christian countries up and till about 1840 when slave trading was prohibited and usury replaced it as another form of slavery. One could not invest in a company unless you worked in that business, even Lloyds the insurance company could only invest in potential cargo profit at that time.

Today there is almost no person that can buy a property or start a business without the need of external financing, and so the entire world is dominated by the financiers. The only power a worker has is the labour of their hands. Even though we may run short of fuel and gas, they too are entitled to earn an adequate wage, so when they go on strike we need to understand that it is the only way that they can negotiate in a profiteering and corrupt system.

Be encouraged today to pray for a peaceful end to the current wage strikes.

David

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