Living wage jumps to $19.05 an hour in Hamilton: Ontario Living Wage Network

The agency that monitors levels of poverty in Hamilton is once again suggesting Ontario’s government needs to review its income security programs amid skyrocketing rents and the cost of food going up.

Tom Cooper, director of the Hamilton Roundtable For Poverty Reduction, says the latest increase in the living wage calculation from the Ontario Living Wage Network (OLWN) suggests social assistance rates are “woefully inadequate.”

“People on the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) have been falling further and further behind,” Cooper told 900 CHML’s Bill Kelly Show.

“To say nothing of people on general welfare … who are forced to subsist on $733 a month, and that comes nowhere close to meeting the cost of rent in any of our communities.”

Hamilton’s living wage – an independent weighted calculation from the OLWN recommending what the province’s minimum wage should be – is up almost $2 year over year, moving from $17.20 in 2021 to $19.05 for 35 hours per week for 50 weeks per year.

It’s a significant increase from the previous update, in which the rate moved to $17.20 per hour from 2019’s $16.45.

The network’s calculations are based on major expenses like rent, transportation, child care and food, as well as things like internet service and “modest” recreational activities.

“The minimum wage is really just a political calculation that governments decide that’s what employers need to pay as a minimum,” Cooper explained.

“But the living wage is something we’re encouraging employers to adopt and pay their employees.”

On Oct. 1, Ontario’s minimum wage rose to $15.50 per hour, but Cooper said that it “comes nowhere close to meeting what workers need to earn” to live and participate in the community, especially in different parts of the province.

The report also illustrates the growing gap between monthly expenses and the incomes for those earning a minimum wage.

The calculations demonstrate that single adults earning the minimum wage are making 82 per cent of a living wage and are $423.92 short of covering basic monthly expenses, those receiving the maximum benefit available for ODSP are making 44 per cent of a living wage and are $1,365.92 short of covering their basic monthly expenses, and those receiving the maximum benefit available for Ontario Works are making 26.5 per cent of a living wage and are $1,860.92 short of covering their basic monthly expenses.

Cooper suggests offering a living wage tends to be good for businesses with regard to employee retention and reduced costs for skills training.

“Plus, it’s good for community because when people are earning more money, that’s money recirculated in the local economies and that’s helping to create economic growth and create jobs,” says Cooper.

The OLWN has a list of some 50 local employers that have signed on to pay their staff a living wage.

Here are the Ontario Living Wage Network’s 2022 living wage rates for 28 Ontario municipalities: