Paying employees their worth: Halifax bicycle shop pays living wage

The repair shop at Cyclesmith is among the busiest in Halifax. Employee Keiran Sharp loves the work and he’s pretty pleased with the pay. He’s among 31 employees earning $23.50 per hour –--the amount determined to be a living wage in Halifax.

“Having the living wage means that I can comfortably work here and take my school part-time, as well as being able to pay rent and groceries,” said Sharp.

A year ago, the shop began paying employees a living wage after the probationary period. Owner Andrew Feenstra said he took a risk that’s paying off.

“Staff are better and we’re retaining staff that may have moved on. [We’re also] attracting new staff that are coming and they’ve heard of our living wage,” he said.

While some businesses can afford to take that risk, others claim they can’t.

“If you implement a cost like that across all employees in your company, somehow you’re going to have to recoup that money unless you’re making high margins, which means you’re going to have increase your prices for your product,” said business professor Ed McHugh.

Many businesses are still recovering after the pandemic. McHugh fears many cannot withstand these additional costs.

“After just surviving the two-and-a-half years, now overlaying the concept of them paying a living wage is a little hard for a lot of businesses to swallow,” he said.

Countries like Sweden have managed to incorporate a living wage by having higher taxes. McHugh said that is not something that taxpayers here would be willing to do.

“Living wage is more about collectivism,” he said. “It’s more about society and taking care of each other, so it’s almost counter-cultural to one of our bigger cultural identifiers, so it’s difficult to put into place.”

In Nova Scotia, minimum wage currently sits below $14 per hour. Meanwhile, the province is seeing the highest rate of inflation in 40 years.

McHugh said businesses need more time before they can consider meeting the living wage.