Factors affecting wages. Factors affecting wages

In conditions market economy to the level wages, its functions and principles of organization are influenced by the following groups of factors: production, social, market, institutional (Fig. 1.3). All these factors are interconnected and together determine the amount of wages, production costs and the well-being of the whole society and representatives of various social groups.

Production factors

Main factor of production, which determines the amount of wages, is the level of development of production and technical progress. Thus, in economically developed countries, a high level of wages is due to high performance labor and application modern technologies production. Technical progress leads to the use of labor-replacing and labor-saving technologies, an increase in labor productivity, an increase in output and, accordingly, an increase in wages.

Technical progress, the production need to improve product quality and expand the functions of the contractor lead to greater complexity of labor and higher qualification requirements for workers. The operation of modern technology involves greater labor intensity and makes increased demands on the cognitive and emotional-volitional processes of the employee - the distribution, switching, concentration and stability of attention, the speed and accuracy of work, the speed of decision-making, which leads to fatigue, a temporary decrease in efficiency and requires significant funds to restore the cost of nervous energy.

Rice. 1.3.

Changes in the complexity of work involve the use of more skilled workers with a corresponding increase in the level of their pay. The essence of the organization of remuneration in these conditions is to adequately assess the complexity of work and the qualifications of workers and, depending on this, choose the form and system of remuneration that takes into account the peculiarities to the maximum extent possible. technological process and the individual contribution of the performer.

Working conditions are a combination of factors production environment and the labor process, which affect the health and performance of a person in the labor process, costs and results of labor. According to the content, production and environmental (temperature, humidity, noise, illumination, etc.), organizational and technical (rate, content of technological operations, ergonomic and aesthetic conditions) and socio-economic (relationships in the team, the presence of production and interpersonal conflicts) conditions are distinguished labor. According to the degree of impact on the body of an employee - comfortable, permissible, harmful (unfavorable) and extreme (traumatic) working conditions.

Working conditions and production environment depend on the applied equipment and technologies, organization labor processes, psychophysiological and socio-psychological compatibility of workers. Improvement of working conditions contributes to high efficiency, reduction of loss of working time due to illness and injury, reduction of additional payments for harmful working conditions and production risk.

The salary change is related to results (manufacturer n awn) labor. It is necessary to analyze due to what factors there is an increase in labor productivity, its relationship with the intensity of labor, the amount of time worked, the complexity of labor and the qualifications of workers.

Quality of work- this is the quality of products and the implementation of the labor process.

Social factors also affect the level of wages, so it is necessary to take into account the mentality of the population, ideas about social justice with the introduction of social guarantees and social protection of the population.

Living wage- this is the cost of the minimum necessary set of means of life for a person, goods that allow him to maintain life.

Consumer basket represents the minimum set of products, goods and services that is required for human life. The consumer basket is established for Russia as a whole and for the constituent entities of the Russian Federation, and is used to calculate the subsistence minimum.

The structure of the consumer basket consists of three parts: food, non-food products and services. The volume of consumption is calculated on average per person for each of the main socio-demographic groups of the population, such as the working-age population, children and pensioners.

In the conditions of market relations, an increase in the subsistence minimum and an expansion of the structure of the consumer basket lead to an increase in the purchasing power of the population and the wage rate.

Minimum wage acts as a state guarantee in the field of wages.

Increasing the share of "social wages"(regular payments for a child, guarantees provided by the state, region, employer) in the total income of an employee acts as a factor restraining the amount of wages.

Conditions for labor mobility provide an opportunity for individuals and social groups move, move to other regions, which increases their competitiveness in the labor market and wages. At the state level, labor movements are due to the discrepancy between the distribution of labor resources by areas of labor application and the requirements of production or the worker. At the level of an enterprise or organization, the cause of labor movements is the discrepancy between the needs, motives, interests of the employee and the requirements placed on him.

Market factors affect the size and regulation of wages and depend on the level of development of the labor market.

Reaching high employment rate is one of the main goals of the macroeconomic policy of the state. An economic system that creates an additional number of jobs aims to increase the amount of the social product and thereby satisfy material needs population. With incomplete use of available labor resources, the economic system functions without reaching the frontier of its production possibilities.

The labor market is one of the most important conditions of the market mechanism. It allows you to effectively use the labor potential of employees, creates competition behind workplace, contributes to the growth of staff qualifications and reduce their turnover. Also, the labor market increases the mobility of personnel and promotes the spread of various forms of employment.

In Art. 1 of the Law of the Russian Federation of April 19, 1991 No. 1032-1 "On employment in Russian Federation"Employment is defined as "the activity of citizens related to the satisfaction of personal and social needs, which does not contradict the legislation of the Russian Federation and, as a rule, brings them earnings, labor income." The main features of employment are:

availability of labor and socially useful activities;

• - legality of this activity;
• - the presence, as a rule, of income (although there may not be income, for example, for students of a full-time university).

Employment management implies a targeted impact on the labor market, expanding demand for labor force, ensuring a balance between the demand and supply of labor in various spheres and sectors of the economy, which involves the allocation of the main types of employment.

Employment rate and fluctuations in labor supply and demand, i.e. market conditions are closely interrelated due to the inflexibility of wages due to the influence of institutional factors (for example, contractual regulation of wage conditions, trade union activities, etc.). The demand for labor in the labor market is derived from the demand for goods and services. Thus, a decrease in demand for certain professions and types of work leads to a decrease in the non-guaranteed flexible part of wages for the relevant workers and has a downward effect on job security.

Longevity established in employment contract working conditions and a firm's focus on wages offered by competitors help to limit the impact of lower labor demand on wages. Excess demand in the labor market for certain categories of workers, respectively, leads to an increase in the wage rate.

Cost of production for labor also act as one of the market factors that determine the amount of wages. On the one hand, the employer is interested in cheap labor, and on the other hand, the level of development of technology, modern equipment, the complexity of labor high requirements to the performer, his qualifications, labor skills, which increases production costs

for the labor force. In addition, the influence of social and institutional factors also hinders the reduction of these costs. But at the same time, the high share of labor costs in total production costs restrains the growth of real wages, if it is not accompanied by a decrease in its unit costs per unit (ruble) of output.

Price dynamics for consumer goods and services, as well as inflation expectations of employees(expectations of the expected level of inflation in the future period due to the factors of the current period) is also a market factor affecting the level of nominal and real wages, since the real and expected increase in the cost of living increases the "price" of the reproduction minimum in the wage rate, which is reflected in ce level, purchasing power, on its mass and share in costs, on its unit costs per ruble of production.

Institutional factors(from lat. institutio - directions, instructions) are associated with the management and regulation of various areas of economic and public relations. They determine the volume, directions and methods of state and regional economic regulation in the organization of wages. These include: the activities of trade unions, associations of employers on contractual regulation of wage conditions, the development and formalization of the system social partnership.

The considered groups of factors have an impact on the level of commemorative and real wages, the ratio of growth rates of labor productivity and production costs, the validity of wage differentiation in various fields and industries.

• Life safety / ed. V. M. Maslova. M., 2014. S. 77.
• URL: center-yf.ru/data/economy/Potrebitelskaya-kor2ina.php.

Salary is a remuneration for work depending on the qualifications of the employee, the complexity, quantity and conditions of the work performed, as well as compensation and incentive payments.

In the socio-economic life of society, wages play an important role: as a personal income, it serves as the main material source of livelihood for workers and their families, and as an aggregate payment demand, it is one of the factors in maintaining and developing production. In a market economy, wages are influenced by a number of market and non-market factors. As a result, a certain level of wages is formed. The determining factors influencing the amount of wages are the interaction of demand for labor and its supply, as well as the level of technology, technology and organization of production, the effectiveness of state policy in this area, the degree of influence of trade unions, etc.

Wages are an element of the employee's income, a form of economic realization of the right of ownership to the labor resource belonging to him. At the same time, for an employer who buys a labor resource to use it as one of the factors of production, the remuneration of employees is one of the elements of production costs.

The opportunity to sell your labor exists only in a market economy. A man, in order to sell his labor, must be personally free. In the traditional system, people do the same thing as their parents. In a command economy, it is up to the authorities, the government, and the state to decide who does what.

The size of supply in the labor market is equal to the size of the economically active population - the total number of people who are self-employed (including in their own enterprise) and the unemployed who are looking for work.

Factors affecting the labor supply:

Demographic (birth rate and age composition of the population)

Social (first of all, the share of working women and pensioners)

Factors that determine the magnitude of demand for labor - economic growth / recession.

The price in the labor market is the wage rate, i.e. its value for a certain unit of time.

Factors affecting the formation of wages:

State minimum wage

performance level

Skill level

Seniority

Intensity

The complexity of labor

Quality and urgency

Dynamics of prices for consumer goods and services

Features of the labor market:

Heterogeneous goods - the labor of different workers is offered different specialties in different areas (but in macroeconomics, we nevertheless consider the labor market, unemployment and employment on the scale of the entire economy as a whole).

The wage rate is less volatile than the prices of other goods. The living conditions of most citizens directly depend on the price.

But things are different for labor sellers. As a rule, labor is the only thing they can sell.

The usual market competition between sellers and buyers (the former want to sell more expensive, the latter want to buy cheaper) in the labor market reaches a degree of sharp contradictions.

The conclusion of a labor contract has an important difference from the purchase of a service.

The main element of wages is the wage rate. However, it does not take into account individual differences in the abilities of workers, their physical strength and endurance, speed of reaction, diligence, etc. Therefore, a variable part is also distinguished in the wage structure, reflecting differences in individual results of labor activity (bonuses, allowances, piecework earnings ). In addition, there are various types of income that an employee can receive due to the fact that he works in this organization (material assistance, food, travel and treatment, valuable gifts, additional medical and pension insurance). Together, wages and these types of income can be considered as the labor income of an employee of this organization.

The main market factors affecting the wage rate include:

1. changes in supply and demand in the market for goods and services, the production of which uses this work. A decrease in demand in the market for goods and services leads to a reduction in output, and consequently to a drop in demand for the resource used and vice versa;

2. the usefulness of the resource for the entrepreneur (the ratio of the marginal income from the use of the labor factor and the marginal cost of this factor). It characterizes the ratio of the marginal income from the use of the labor factor and the marginal costs for this factor;

3. elasticity of demand for labor. An increase in the price of a resource, an increase in the costs of an entrepreneur, lead to a decrease in the demand for labor, and hence the conditions of employment. At the same time, the price elasticity of demand for labor is not always the same and depends on the nature of the dynamics of marginal income, the share of resource costs in costs, and the elasticity of demand for goods;

4. interchangeability of resources. The employer's ability to reduce labor costs with the same technical base is limited. The main opportunities for reducing labor costs are associated with a reduction in the variable part of earnings, however, the conditions of collective labor agreements act as a deterrent;

5. change in prices for consumer goods and services. The rise in prices for goods and services causes an increase in the cost of living, i.e., an increase in the reproduction minimum in the structure of the wage rate.



Since labor power is a commodity, its price is also regulated by the relationship between supply and demand. Wages are affected by the same factors as the cost of labor.

An important factor is the increase in the general educational and qualification level of employees. Thus, in the United States, people without secondary education in the mid-80s received 19 thousand dollars a year, and with higher education- 32 thousand dollars. In 2010, highly educated workers received almost 90% higher wages than other categories. This indicates the recognition of the importance and prestige of the work of engineers, managers, and people of creative work. However, such dependence does not mean the validity of the concept of human capital, according to which knowledge, skills and other human abilities that affect the growth of production and income are capital, but this capital is formed by the costs of education, training of labor force in production, medical service etc. The purpose of such a concept is to prove the possibility of transforming employees with knowledge into capitalists.

This point of view has:

identification of expenses for education, qualifications of an employee with capital. At the same time, capital is considered only from the point of view of material content, its socio-economic aspect is not taken into account, i.e. property relations between employees and owners of capital;

ignoring the fact that the costs of developing education, acquiring qualifications form only the ability to work, a labor force of appropriate quality. If a person works in his own enterprise, his ability to work ceases to be variable capital.

This concept does not find confirmation in the event of the loss of work by workers, since the acquired knowledge and qualifications cannot ensure the survival of the unemployed.

The presence of a close relationship between the level of education, qualifications and the amount of wages is evidenced by the existence of such patterns: the amount of wages and its differentiation depend on the complexity of the labor force and its quality; the amount of costs for the formation of a workforce of appropriate quality and the amount of wages received in the course of labor activity should be a ratio of one to three to four. Under these conditions, there will be an expanded reproduction of the labor force of an appropriate quality, and the family of an employee can fully perform the functions assigned to it.

From the point of view of the neoclassical direction, a modern employee, selling a temporary disposal of his labor force to a capitalist, makes a choice between two types of utility - between the desire to earn the maximum amount of money, to buy necessary goods, services for yourself and your family and free time for recreation, entertainment, household chores. But since he is forced to work (economic coercion to work), he tries to balance between these two types of utility, reaching approximately the optimum, at which the marginal utility of one hour of leisure is equal to the marginal utility of goods and services that can be purchased with the amount of money earned during the hour. . Hourly wages are a kind of alternative to one hour of leisure. Along with rising wages, the value of leisure also increases, since more free time is needed for personal development.

Under such conditions, the employee tries to work better (substitution effect), and getting a higher salary allows you to buy a larger set of goods and services at stable prices (income effect). As wages rise, the supply of labor increases. However, as wages increase, the income effect gradually increases, the price of leisure becomes higher, and the supply of labor decreases. Therefore, in the course of evolution economic system capitalism, positive dynamics between the two types of utility, there comes a period when the growth of wages leads not to an increase, but to a reduction in the working day. In turn, the entrepreneur to hire additional workers until they increase his income, that is, until the marginal product of the use of labor in a unit of value equals the wage.

However, this concept is divorced from practice. In fact, the reduction of the working day is due to many factors, including the struggle of workers for their rights, the growth of self-awareness and a sense of human dignity of employees, the operation of the law of growth of needs (primarily in the development of the individual), the law of growth in labor productivity (the result of which is the ability to satisfy growing material and spiritual needs of workers with a decrease in the length of the working day), etc. The average working week over the past 150 years has decreased from 70 to 40 hours due to the action of these factors (in France in 2000 - up to 35 hours). However, this pattern is not observed over relatively short time intervals. So, in the 90s, the duration of the working week in the United States and some other countries due to overtime work increased by about 1.5 hours.

Wages can be influenced by trade unions which, on behalf of their members, negotiate wages, working conditions, additional payments and others. Thus, the supply of labor is limited due to the inclusion of certain specialties by trade unions in the list of licensed professions, reduction of the working day, reduction of overtime work, reduction of the retirement age, restrictions on migration, etc. Therefore, the wages of trade union members in developed countries are approximately 10 15% higher than other workers.

The amount of wages is also affected by working conditions, inflation rates, etc. The lower limit of wages is the minimum. Minimum wage - the wages of employees, which are established by national legislation (or collective agreements between business unions and trade unions at the sectoral and regional levels) at a level that ensures the minimum needs and social protection of an unskilled worker and their families.

In Russia, the minimum wage or minimum wage is a statutory minimum used to regulate wages, as well as to determine the amount of temporary disability benefits. The minimum wage is also used to determine the amount of taxes, fees, fines and other payments that are calculated in accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation, depending on the minimum wage. Employers are not entitled to pay employees a monthly wage in an amount less than the minimum wage. However, if an employee works part-time or part-time, then per month he can receive an amount less than the minimum wage, and there are no legislative obstacles here.

The minimum wage (SMIC) is regulated federal law No. 82-FZ of June 19, 2000 "On the minimum wage", as well as Article 133 Labor Code Russian Federation (Labor Code of the Russian Federation).

According to the convention of the International Labor Organization, each member that has ratified it must introduce a minimum wage fixing system covering all employees whose working conditions make it appropriate to apply such a system. When determining the minimum wage, it is necessary to take into account the needs of employees and their families, the average level of wages in the country, the dynamics of the cost of living, social benefits, the level of productivity and labor intensity, the demographic situation, etc. These requirements are not met in Russia.

The reference point in determining the minimum wage in many developed countries is the average wage. According to the findings of an international commission set up by the EEC in 1969, the fair minimum wage is 68% of the average national wage. In the UK, France, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland and some other countries, the minimum wage ranges from 55 to 68% average salary, and in the USA, Japan and some other countries - up to 40%.

AT former USSR the cost of the minimum consumer budget was chosen as the basis for calculating the minimum wage. To do this, the prices of state, cooperative stores, in the market, etc. are calculated. Such a calculation shows the prices at which households purchase goods and services. In addition, in many countries prices are additionally studied by trade unions, independent experts and organizations. At the same time, the minimum set of food products is calculated for various age and sex groups of the population per capita: children in different ages(from 1-3, 4-6, 7-10 and 11-18 years old), boys and girls separately at the age of 14-17 years old, men (18-59 years old, 60-74 years old and over 75 years old) and women ( 18-54 years old, 55-74 and over 75 years old), and for each age group the total calorie content of these products is established.

Another option for determining the minimum consumer budget is the minimum set of food products for men of working age. This set included 75 items of food, 45 - clothes and shoes, 24 - durable items, 24 - furniture, 31 - utensils, expenses for sanitary items, hygiene, transportation costs, housing costs, communications, medicines, cultural services. and etc.

The subsistence minimum, according to Rosstat, in accordance with the Federal Law of October 24, 1997 No. 134-FZ "On the subsistence minimum in the Russian Federation" is a cost estimate of the consumer basket, including the minimum sets of food, non-food products and services necessary to maintain health person and ensure his life, as well as mandatory payments and fees. The subsistence minimum for the 3rd quarter of 2015 in Russia as a whole is set as follows:

per capita - 9881 rubles;

for the able-bodied population - 10518 rubles;

for pensioners - 7963 rubles;

for children - 9958 rubles.

Another method of setting the minimum wage is to compare it with the cost of a living wage, determined by the physiological norms of food consumption, which is an indicator of the level of poverty.

The minimum wage in some developed countries is based on a set of goods and services that satisfies not only the physiological, but also the social needs of both an individual and families with one, two, three children, etc.

A less perfect method of determining the minimum wage is its comparison with typical family budgets, since the elements of such budgets are not only the wages of the head of the family and its individual working members, but also dividends, interest on deposits, rent, etc. An excessively low level of the minimum wages leads to the process of depopulation of the population, the degradation of a significant amount of the workforce, a high level of crime and other negative phenomena.

In a market economy, the level, functions and principles of organizing wages are influenced by various market and non-market factors, which together determine the level of earnings of workers, production costs, as well as the well-being of the whole society (see Fig. 1.2).

Rice. 1.2

Among the market factors affecting the wage rate and the labor market situation, the following can be distinguished (see Figure 1.2.).

1. Change in supply and demand in the market of goods and services in the production of which this labor is used. A decrease in demand in the market for goods and services (as a result of rising prices for them, a decrease in consumer incomes, changes in consumer preferences, and displacement by new goods) leads to a reduction in output, and, consequently, to a drop in demand for the labor resource used and worsening employment conditions. On the contrary, an increase in the demand for goods and services can lead to an increase in the demand for labor and an increase in the wage rate.

2. The usefulness of the resource for the entrepreneur (the ratio of the marginal income from the use of the labor factor and the marginal cost of this factor).

The increase in the demand for labor largely depends on how long the entrepreneur can use the extensive factors of growth in the profitability of his enterprise. In other words, how long will it be cost-effective to attract additional workers with the same characteristics of other factors of production, in particular technical equipment.

3. Elasticity of demand for labor with respect to price. An increase in the price of a resource (for example, an increase in the wage rate under pressure from trade unions), increasing the costs of the entrepreneur, leads to a decrease in the demand for labor, and consequently, to a deterioration in the conditions of employment. At the same time, the price elasticity of demand for labor (its response to fluctuations in the labor chain) is not always the same and depends on:

nature of marginal revenue dynamics. Thus, if marginal revenue falls slowly (labor-intensive industries with a high share of manual labor), then the increase in prices for the labor resource causes a slow decrease in demand in the labor market, i.e. price elasticity of demand is weak. On the contrary, if the opportunities for obtaining a return on additional attraction of workers are exhausted quickly (a sharp decrease in marginal income), then an increase in the wage rate will cause a sharp drop in the demand for labor, i.e. in this case, the demand in the market for this labor resource is highly elastic;

the share of the cost of the labor resource in the costs of the firm. The higher the share of labor costs in total costs the production of goods, especially the demand for labor depends on the price of labor, since the change in labor costs will largely determine the dynamics of total costs;

the elasticity of demand for goods in the production of which this labor is used. For example, the demand for food products such as bread and salt depends little on their price, and therefore the demand for labor used in their production will depend to a lesser extent on its price.

4. Interchangeability of resources. Considering the impact of this factor, it should be noted that the employer's ability to reduce labor costs with an unchanged technical base is significantly limited. The fact is that there is a so-called ratchet effect in the price of labor. In other words, the wage rate, being quite mobile, upwards, practically does not move downwards when the situation on the labor market changes. In this case, the question arises of the possibility of replacing living labor with more productive equipment.

This interchangeability of resources, the availability of more productive equipment on the market, can have a twofold effect on terms of employment and labor market conditions, depending on which effect is preferable to the employer. Two options are possible: the first is the so-called substitution effect, i.e. reduction of personnel with a constant or increasing output as a result of the introduction new technology. Demand in the labor market is declining, the redundant workers increase the supply of labor, which together worsen the conditions of employment and the possibility of wage increases.

The second option is the so-called output growth effect as a result of the use of high-performance equipment, which significantly reduces average production costs and increases its profitability. In this case, the demand for labor will not show a clear downward trend.

5. Change in prices for consumer goods and services. An increase in prices for consumer goods and services, causing an increase in the cost of living, will primarily entail an increase in the reproduction minimum in the structure of the wage rate, and hence the level of wages as a whole. With a decrease in prices for consumer goods and services, there will be no such direct dependence, if we take into account the already mentioned ratchet effect.

Non-market factors:

1. Measures state regulation related to the establishment of a minimum wage, the level of compensatory surcharges guaranteed by law.

2. The wage rate and conditions of employment can be significantly influenced by the politics of trade unions, the strength of the trade union movement.

3. The final results of the enterprise and the personal labor contribution of the employee - this factor is directly dependent on the amount of wages.

Remuneration in our country plays a dual function: on the one hand, it is the main source of income for workers and an increase in their living standards, on the other hand, it is the main lever of material incentives for growth and increasing production efficiency. The most important are the following functions of wages: reproductive, stimulating, regulating (distributive).

The reproductive function consists in ensuring the possibility of labor force reproduction at a socially normal level of consumption, that is, in determining such an absolute amount of wages that allows the conditions for the normal reproduction of labor force to be realized, in other words, maintaining, and even improving the living conditions of an employee who should be able to live normally (pay for an apartment, food, clothes, i.e. basic necessities), which should have a real opportunity to rest from work in order to restore the strength necessary for work.

Also, the employee must be able to raise and educate children, future labor resources. Hence the original meaning of this function, its defining role in relation to others. This is especially true today, when almost all issues of wages are reduced mainly to the possibility of ensuring a decent standard of living. However, the crisis situation in Russia is characterized by a significant decrease in the purchasing power of wages.

The stimulating function is important from the point of view of the management of the enterprise: it is necessary to encourage the employee to labor activity, to maximize returns, and increase labor efficiency. This goal is served by establishing the amount of earnings depending on the results of labor achieved by each. The separation of wages from the personal labor efforts of workers undermines the labor basis of wages, leads to a weakening of the stimulating function of wages, to its transformation into a consumer function and extinguishes the initiative and labor efforts of a person.

The employee should be interested in improving his qualifications in order to receive more earnings, because. higher qualifications pay more. Enterprises are interested in more highly qualified personnel to increase labor productivity and improve product quality.

The implementation of the incentive function is carried out by the management of the enterprise through specific remuneration systems based on the assessment of labor results and the relationship between the size of the payroll fund (PAY) and the efficiency of the enterprise.

The main direction of improving the entire system of organizing wages is to ensure a direct and rigid dependence of wages on the final results economic activity labor collectives. In solving this problem, an important role is played by right choice and rational application of forms and systems of wages, which will be discussed below.

The regulatory function of wages affects the ratio between the demand and supply of labor, the formation of personnel (number of employees and vocational qualifications) and the degree of its employment. This function plays the role of balancing the interests of employees and employers. The objective basis for the implementation of this function is the principle of differentiation of wages by groups of employees, according to the priority of activities or other grounds (signs), i.e. development of a specific policy for establishing the level of remuneration for various groups (categories) of workers in specific production conditions. It is subject to regulation labor relations between social partners on mutually acceptable terms and is reflected in the collective agreement.

This principle can be successfully used only if the mechanism of pricing in the labor market and the behavior of subjects of market relations associated with it are taken into account. The specificity of the product "labor power" requires a distinction between the concepts of "labor price" and "labor price"

The price of labor is monetary value its cost, reflecting, according to segmentation criteria, the level of costs necessary for the reproduction of the labor force, taking into account supply and demand in the labor market. The price of labor power can be the basis for the formation of a policy of wage differentiation at the enterprise, as well as for the establishment of contractual conditions for remuneration of a particular employee hired by the employer.

The price of labor is the monetary expression of the various qualities of labor, it allows you to measure the amount of labor with its payment. The unit of measurement can be the price of an hour of labor, which is a derivative of the price of labor power, determining the conditions for remunerating an employee based on the results of his work. current activities under the conditions of the mechanism domestic market labor in the enterprise. Prices for various types of labor take the form of calculated tariff rates (official salaries). By setting the price of a particular type of labor, the enterprise regulates wages so that, on the one hand, it does not underestimate its level (otherwise qualified personnel will leave), and on the other hand, it does not overprice, so that the company's products are competitive not only in terms of consumer qualities, but also at the price of goods (products, services). Otherwise, the volume of sales (sales, revenue) may decrease, which will affect the demand for the labor force, its employment, etc.

To implement the above functions, it is necessary to comply with the following most important principles of remuneration:

granting independence to enterprises in the organization of wages, in establishing the forms, systems and amount of remuneration of employees;

differentiation of wages in accordance with the results of labor, its quantity and quality. This principle is based on the need to strengthen the material interest of workers in improving the skills of their work, ensuring High Quality products. Currently, this principle, to put it mildly, is not respected. The paradox lies in the fact that the level of qualification of workers does not correspond to the amount of wages they receive. Thus, in industries with more skilled workers, including education, culture, art, health care, the average monthly accrued nominal wages are below the national average. The discrepancy between wages and the level of qualifications leads to an outflow of personnel from those industries designed to promote the scientific, technical and cultural progress of the country;

material interest of workers in high end results of labor;

strengthening social security (timely payment of wages, indexation);

outstripping growth of labor productivity over the growth of wages.

When considering issues of remuneration, it is necessary to distinguish between monetary (nominal) and real wages. Nominal wage is the amount of money received per hour, day, week, etc. Real wages are the amount of goods and services that can be purchased with nominal wages; real wages are the "purchasing power" of nominal wages. Obviously, real wages depend on nominal wages and the prices of goods and services purchased. When nominal wages rise, but at the same time the cost of food, housing, clothing, and other essential goods increases even more, real wages fall. This primarily concerns the current situation in Russia, the main part of earnings (up to 60-70%) is spent on food, for comparison, in developed countries 20-30% of wages are directed to food.

In the course of the formation of market relations in Russia, there was a decrease in the reproductive and stimulating role of wages. This led to a decrease in labor productivity, a weakening of the relationship between wages and work results, an increase in non-production costs and an excessive increase in prices for manufactured products, a decrease in efficiency production activities enterprises and the functioning of sectors of the economy.

The decline in labor productivity in production management was largely facilitated by a steady downward trend in the price of labor - the real wages of workers in material production, and especially in state-owned enterprises. The low price of labor and its unreasonable differentiation by sectors of the economy and enterprises of the industry have increased the gap between wages, both with the cost of labor, and with the quantity and quality of labor. This was facilitated by the dismissive attitude of many business executives to the organization of labor, production and management, to the organization of remuneration and labor rationing.

During the years of formation of market relations, as a result of a decrease in production volumes, rising prices for energy carriers, raw materials and other factors, the ratio of the growth rates of labor productivity and wages was disturbed.

With the organization of wages at the enterprise, regardless of the form of ownership and types of activity, the solution of a two-pronged task is connected:

guarantee remuneration for each employee in accordance with the results of his work and the cost of labor in the labor market;

provide the employer (regardless of who the employer is):

state, joint-stock company, a private person or someone else) achievement in the process of production of such a result that would allow him (after the sale of products on the market of goods) to recover costs and make a profit.

Thus, through the organization of wages, the necessary compromise between the interests of the employer and the employee is achieved, contributing to the development of social partnership relations between the two driving forces of the market economy.

Thus, the level of wages is ultimately determined by the level of productivity social labor: the higher the level of labor productivity in society, the greater the volume of the social product, the greater the share of the product that falls on a unit of labor, the higher the level of payment. This general, taken in its purest form, explains not only the differences in the level of wages in the same country at different periods of history, but also largely the differences in wages in different countries.

Wages seem to be a simple and clear phenomenon. Under an employment contract, a person is obliged to work at an enterprise (in an institution) for a specified time, and an entrepreneur in exchange for his work is obliged to pay a certain amount of money. This is how a transaction for the purchase and sale of labor is made. Therefore, wages are outwardly perceived as the price (monetary expression) of labor as a commodity.

Meanwhile, perhaps the most important thing is unclear: How is wages determined? Apparently, this issue is solved differently by the participants in the market transaction.

The employer is interested in hiring a person who has a workforce of normal quality. It's about, at least about the average performance, which provides the proper quantity and quality of work.

In turn, the owner of the labor force does not sell it to the businessman forever (otherwise he would turn into a slave), but for a certain period. He is interested, firstly, in ensuring that the enterprise provides him with normal time and working conditions. Secondly, he needs such wages, which can be used to purchase all the blessings of life to restore the labor force - the totality of physical and spiritual abilities for work. In other words, the normal wage is equal to the value of the means of subsistence necessary for the reproduction and development of labor power.

However, it is important to note the following circumstance. Labor power is a completely unusual - a living and, one might say, animated commodity. Unlike ordinary useful things, the magnitude of the value of labor power has two quantitative limits. The lowest - physiological - limit is equal to the cost of life's goods and services, which are sufficient to restore the working capacity of a person with the lowest level of qualification. The upper limit includes the value of the totality of social and cultural goods and services that are required for the reproduction of a highly skilled labor force. Such a set historically varies depending on the degree of development of the economy and civilization in each country. Now in the most developed countries it may include, say, a multi-room apartment for a family or a country cottage, private cars, modern electronic information, sports equipment, a good library, and much more.

But economic interests concerning the provision of normal wages and normal working conditions diverged greatly among businessmen and employees, especially in the initial phase of the development of capitalism. Entrepreneurs sought to reduce the earnings of workers to their own low level. The famous English writer Charles Dickens (1812-1870) in his novels The Adventures of Oliver Twist, Dombey and Son and other works described the very difficult working and living conditions of the poor. However, P. Samuelson and V. Nordhaus did not fully agree with the writer:

“Even the novels of Dickens hardly fully reflect the horrendous conditions of child labor, the danger of harmful production and the terrible sanitary conditions in factories at the beginning of the 19th century. The 84-hour work week prevailed, with a break for breakfast and sometimes for dinner. You could squeeze a lot of work out of a 6-year-old child, and if a woman lost a couple of fingers at the loom, she still had eight, so she was quite suitable for further work.

For several centuries the free enterprise system was unable to solve the problem of normalizing the conditions of wage labor and wages. Therefore, social protests against the arbitrariness of this system multiplied and intensified. Finally, in the 1930s and 1950s 20th century in Western countries ah, the state acted as a guarantor of one of the important conditions for the economic security of workers. It has legislated a minimum wage that everyone, including private firms, must comply with. Thus, in the United States, for the first time in 1938, the minimum wage rate was legally set at 25 cents (V4 dollars) per hour. 1995 size hourly pay labor amounted to 17.2 dollars.

For determining minimum wage government agencies (in the US and other countries) calculate the so-called living wage (or poverty line). It is usually set for a family of four (an employee, his wife and two children), based on the standards for satisfying the least necessities of life in many goods and services, taking into account the price level. At the same time, it is supposed to provide living conditions for the employee who performs the most simple job. Of course, the minimum wage is only the starting level, from which the payment for more complex work begins to grow.

Factors that determine wages

So, we can draw the following conclusion. The formation of wages primarily depends on the material and socio-cultural conditions for the reproduction of the labor force. In this regard, the amount of remuneration for work is determined by a number of specific socio-economic factors. What are these factors?

1. As we have seen, the amount of wages depends on the value of the means of subsistence spent on the reproduction of labor power.
2. An important role in increasing earnings is played by the skill level of employees. In other words, it affects the size of investment in "human capital".
3. The level of labor productivity, which has been quite high in recent decades due to the introduction of the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution, significantly affects the amount of remuneration for labor. It is quite natural that at technologically advanced enterprises the volume of products produced increases, its quality improves, and workers are rewarded with higher earnings.
4. The amount of wages is largely influenced by national differences in the degree of development of economic and social conditions of life in different countries. These differences ultimately depend on the scientific and technological level of production and labor efficiency, the degree of development of the labor force, the achieved socially normal quality of life, and other factors. This is clearly seen from the table.

Table. National Pay Differences (in manufacturing, 1995)

In terms of wages, the United States has long been the leader in the Western world. Now a new technological revolution is leading to an ever greater leveling of technical and economic conditions in developed countries. The cost of labor is rising in many countries, and global competition between various countries by the degree of use of skilled labor. It is noteworthy that in the 50-80s. 20th century in the West there was a significant increase in real wages. Especially significantly - 2-3 times - it increased in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, 4 times - in Japan. As a result, the gap in national wage levels has narrowed, and these countries have approached or overtaken the US level.

At the same time, it is clear that much less developed states are very far behind Western countries. This gap is explained primarily by the difference in scientific, technical and economic indicators production, in the skill level of workers.

In addition to the socio-reproductive factors we have considered, market factors significantly affect the amount of wages.

The first is supply and demand for . The amount of remuneration for labor may vary in accordance with the laws of price on offer and price on demand.

When demand exceeds supply, the price of a particular type of labor is above the equilibrium price point. Now, under the influence of the scientific and technological revolution, the demand for highly qualified workers is not fully satisfied, and this leads to an increase in the wages of specialists with secondary and higher education. On the other hand, the demand for unskilled labor is in most cases falling, which negatively affects the earnings of people who do not have a secondary level of education. Notable is the data for the United States. In 1996, the average hourly earnings (in dollars) were: doctors - 60, lawyers - 45, oil engineers - 34, construction workers - 18, mechanics - 11, workers in the entertainment industries and salesmen in retail stores- 7 dollars.

Intellectual workers with academic degrees earn 5 times more than those who did not graduate from high school.

The second market factor affecting the amount of remuneration for work is competition in the labor market. Here the rivalry naturally leads to an approximation of the level of wages to the equilibrium price of labor. This means that competition acts as an equalizer of earnings. Simply put, the labor market affirms the principle: equal pay for equal work.

True, in modern conditions such perfect competition is rare. But discrimination is still allowed - restriction or deprivation of the rights of certain groups of citizens on the basis of race or nationality, gender, religious and political beliefs, etc. Thus, in the United States, women or workers belonging to national minorities (having the same abilities, education, qualifications and experience as white men) are treated as people of an inferior class in hiring, providing certain professions, promotion or increase wages.

It also shows its strength in the labor market. First of all, the monopolists of the means of production - employers are trying to dictate their terms of remuneration to workers. They are interested in unemployment, which weakens the opposing force and makes it possible to reduce wages. In turn, the organization of workers into free, independent trade unions allows them, through collective agreements with employers, to conduct a counteroffensive and defend common economic interests.

Clashes between employers and trade unions can at times, especially in bad economic conditions, be violent. The strike struggle sometimes reaches such a high intensity that it can even paralyze the entire economic life. It is no coincidence that in many countries the state intervenes in relations between businessmen and workers, their trade unions. As a result, a kind of "triangle" is formed. It interacts with unions of entrepreneurs, trade unions and the state, which thereby regulates many aspects of labor relations and wages.