29 September 2003
General Topic: Social Doctrine
Johannesburg Intervention:
The Just Wage
…ut ea se uxoremque et liberos tueri commonodum queat…
Prof. Stuart C. Bate OMI
The dignity of the human person created in the image of God, and the social value of the common good, rooted in the requirement to love our neighbour, inform a Catholic Social Teaching which requires mutual respect between people and the promotion of a human society where all live a fully human life. The issue of just wages is part of this teaching. Wages are a fruit of human work and serve to allow the worker to live a proper human life in society (CCC 2434). In the scriptures, James (5:4) is scathing in his rebuke to those who pay unjust wages. "Labourers mowed your fields and you cheated them. Listen to the wages you kept back calling out; realise that the cries of the reapers have reached the Lord of Hosts". And Jesus’ parable (Mt 20: 1-16) of the householder hiring workers shows him paying the same wage to those hired at different times during the day much to the consternation of those with more materialistic understandings of social justice. Catholic social doctrine affirms the existence of certain basic minimums that must be met. That is why mere agreement between employer and employee about wages is not sufficient to articulate satisfactory recompense for service (CCC 2434). Workers are often at a disadvantage in such negotiated agreements
The Church’s teaching on the just wage is quite clear. "Remuneration for work should guarantee man the opportunity to provide a dignified livelihood for himself and his family on the material, social, cultural and spiritual level, taking into account the role and the productivity of each, the state of the business, and the common good." (CCC 2434 cfr. GS 67). In 1891 Pope Leo XIII was the first to teach about this issue within the modern industrial context. His words have remained as the foundation upon which this teaching has been developed. Leo wrote that a ‘workman's wages be sufficient to enable him comfortably to support himself, his wife, and his children" (RN 46). In 1961 Blessed John XXIII affirms the same teaching but rephrases it as follows: "workers must be paid a wage which allows them to live a truly human life and to fulfill their family obligations in a worthy manner." (MM 71). I have cited these different texts as examples of the consistency of this teaching
The issue of just wages is a metaphor for the distribution of wealth within a society. A society’s income must be distributed in such a way that the common good is affirmed and that all are provided with access to a decent human life. The reality in our global context is quite different. The United Nations issues a Human Development Report each year ranking the quality of human life in all nations. It is sad to report from this continent that in the latest (2003) report the bottom 23 countries in the list are all African countries. In fact 39 African countries are in the bottom 50. There are only 9 African countries are in the top 120 countries in the list, with the highest, Libya, at position 61. This horrendous offense against the African people is a global indicator of the way the wealth of the world is not shared out according to the teaching affirmed by Leo and subsequent Catholic Social Doctrine.
CCC The Catechism of the Catholic Church
GS Gaudium et Spes. Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. Vatican II
1965
MM Mater et Magistra. Encyclical Letter of Pope John XXIII May 15, 1961.
RN Rerum Novarum. Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on capital and labor May, 1891
United Nations Human Development Index country indicators. Available at