YOUNG ADULTS ARE experiencing an icy welcome to the world of work, where compensation for their labour is determined by the arbitrary date on which they were born.

At present, wages for younger adults and teenagers are doled out on the following basis:

Adults aged 20 and over: This cohort receives full minimum wage (€14.15 per hour)

19-year-olds: This group is entitled to 90% of minimum wage (€12.74 per hour)

18-year-olds: A slightly decreased 80% of minimum wage (€11.32 per hour)

Anybody below the age of 18: 70% of minimum wage (€9.91).

This means a 17-year-old will come out €34 worse off than a 20-year-old for an eight-hour shift. That’s €170 per week extra for the 20-year-old, if they’re both working full-time, which is not an inconsequential sum of money. It represents a monthly disparity of €680 between older and younger workers, often doing the same work.

The idea of sub-minimum wage calls the whole concept of minimum wage into question. The entire idea of “minimum” wage is to tackle poverty and inequality, so why is it possible to pay people below that threshold? With this system, we acknowledge a certain income is necessary to make ends meet, and we opt not to give that to young adults.

Irish trade unions have called the practice discriminatory, with good reason. By definition, age-based discrimination is the “less favourable treatment of one person compared with another because they are of different ages.” This is why it’s legally risky to ask someone’s date of birth in an interview or advertise a job........

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