The human dignity of our more vulnerable brethren

The proposal made by Caritas that the minimum weekly wage should rise from €158 to €180, a rise of almost 14 per cent, has under­standably been the subject of much discussion.

Thousands of citizens at present live below the €180 benchmark- Fr Robert Soler, SJ

The Church agency is in constant touch with the needy. It had already taken this stand two years ago. Now it has reiterated its call and backed it up by a detailed year-long study by a team of experts.

The report, entitled ‘A minimum budget for a decent living’, includes in the household budget only what is strictly essential for a decent but frugal life of three specified groups, therefore leaving out tobacco, alcohol and even the use of a mobile phone.

To avoid escalation on wages all across the board, the proposal includes a call to government to legislate against wage-increase demands based merely on comparisons with a newly introduced higher minimum wage.

Whereas the call has been welcomed by the labour force and the unions that represent it, employers claim it would damage competitiveness and positively discourage investment, thus hurting the economy and ultimately workers’ jobs. The political parties’ comments did not take up the proposal directly, while the Cabinet last week invited Caritas to a meeting to present its case.

The core ethical issues here seem to be human dignity and what is a ‘just wage’. Catholic social teaching is very clear that the whole economic set-up is not an end in itself, but exists for human beings.

Human dignity has to have pride of place in society, even when one is considering the economic set-up. Work is the expression of the human being and exists for the person performing it.

As the product of men and women who provide it, work is more important than capital. Stated succinctly, the human being is more important than work and work is more important than capital.

It follows that where, as with Caritas’ proposal, the more vulnerable members of society need a rise in minimum income for them to have a standard of living considered merely decent in a EU country, they have a very strong case – because of their dignity as human beings.

The other point is that the proposal amounts to an implicit affirmation that, in the present socio-economic reality of Malta – even given the existing social benefits – a just wage that remunerates work has to be quantified at €180 per week.

Remuneration is a vital element for achieving justice in work-relationships. A just wage is the legitimate fruit of work. In 1892, Pope Leo XIII had stated that the just wage “must not be below the level of subsistence”.

Vatican II in 1965 considered the right level of remuneration as that which furnishes human beings with “the capacity to cultivate in a worthy manner a material, social, cultural and spiritual life for themselves and their dependents, having regard to the assignment and productivity of each, as well as the conditions of work and the common good” (Gaudium et Spes, 67).

Even the mere contractual agreement between an employer and an employee fails to qualify as a ‘just wage’ if the remuneration is too scant to guarantee the decent life that an employee has a right to; in this case, natural justice trumps even freedom to contract and is above it.

Clearly, in reaching conclusions, this or a future government, possibly soon after the next election, will have to take into consideration the common good, which includes relevant social and economic factors.

Above all, however, it has to look at the more vulnerable thousands of citizens who at present live below the €180 benchmark.

The Caritas proposal, coming as it does from a Christian agency, affirms a faith that actively seeks justice. Presenting the proposal, Mgr Victor Grech stressed that money can be found for the human needs of our more vulnerable citizens. In this he must be right.

Whatever political view one might hold, a society is truly civilised and Christian to the extent that it can effectively take care of its weaker citizens.