The government has fixed a minimum wage for temporary work, to stop eastern undercutting.

ECONOMIST: Germany's labour market

In the long term, living with a fixed exchange rate demands wage and price flexibility.

ECONOMIST: Exchange rates

Under 5% of the US wage earners make the minimum wage or less, which means that since wage earners only represent a bit over half the total work force (the rest are paid a fixed salary), those who earn the minimum wage make up less than 3% of the total work force.

FORBES: The Minimum Wage: Putting the First Rung on the Ladder of Success Out of Reach

The business machine companies argue from their long experience of the market that more complicated and versatile computors are unnecessary unless the most abstruse scientific calculations are involved, and they offer instead or will shortly offer calculators that can be given a fixed but limited programme to follow, on the lines of the wage calculations now being done at Lyons.

ECONOMIST: The business world

In addition, the government has imposed new social-security contributions on low-wage jobs, and tightened restrictions on the self-employed, part-time work and fixed-term contracts.

ECONOMIST: European economies