By DPA
Hong Kong : Poverty among workers in wealthy Hong Kong has almost doubled to more than 418,000 people over the past decade, an Oxfam report has said.
And though the city’s cost of living continues to rise, more than twice as many people in the city of 6.9 million earn 3,000 Hong Kong dollars (385 US dollars) or less than a decade ago, according to Oxfam.
Oxfam director general John Sayer said: “Our particular concern is the growth in people who do a long hard day’s work but still don’t earn enough at the end of that day for them and their families to have a decent life. We think that is unacceptable.”
He called for a minimum wage to be introduced and for the government to use the taxation system to create “a more equal, fair and just society”.
The Oxfam report is the second in a week to highlight the widening rich-poor gulf in the former British colony, which reverted to Chinese rule in 1997.
A study last week by the Hong Kong Council for Social Services found that more than 20 percent of Hong Kong families – 1.33 million people – now live on monthly incomes of less than $900 for a two-person household and $1,500 for a four-person household.
Welfare and labour groups in Hong Kong have long campaigned for increased workers’ rights and a minimum wage to protect the low-paid.
However, the government has repeatedly resisted the demands, saying that a minimum wage would lead to redundancies and adversely affect small companies in the business-oriented city.