G20 wage rise proposal falls flat

The G20 labour ministers support reducing exclusion and exploitation of workers, and growing their country's tax base, but have baulked at a proposal to use wage rises to address sluggish global growth.

One of the first items discussed at the G20 Labour and Employment Ministerial Meeting in Melbourne was modelling which suggests a one percentage point rise in wages, as a share of GDP, could lead to a 0.36 per cent increase in global GDP.

A co-ordinated increase in wage share of up to five per cent across G20 nations could deliver the G20's commitment to boost GDP by more than two per cent by 2018.

Sharan Burrow, the Brussels-based general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and former president of the ACTU, said the wage rise proposal was a point of debate.

"There is a number of areas of consensus ... if you look do the question of inclusion of young people, women's participation, ending forced (work) or modern-day slavery and reducing informal jobs," Ms Burrow told AAP on Wednesday.

"However, there is no real recognition that if we've had a wages slump of 10 per cent, thereabouts, over the last three decades and indeed you accept that the G20 countries are collectively wage-led in terms of growth, then how do we go about raising the income share for workers?

"That's not on the table in any way that is going to drive that extra growth."

Ms Burrow said without an "upward push on wages, and income share, broadly in G20 countries then we are set for slow growth for a very long time".

Also on the table was a joint World Bank, OECD and International Labour Organization report that says slow post-global financial crisis growth is hampering a jobs recovery in G20 nations, where more than 100 million people are unemployed.

There are also 447 million "working poor" who live on less than $2 per day, and rising wage inequality and youth unemployment in advanced G20 economies.

"... So you have the rise of fundamentalism and, in Europe, they are talking of the rise of fascism," Ms Burrow said.

"We need to be a collective, cohesive society and that means sharing our wealth."