Tax credits should not be used to subsidise low-wage employers

Owen Jones is right to highlight the plight of the working poor but wrong to suggest the answer should have ever been tax credits (Opinion, theguardian.com, 16 October). It can never be right to subsidise poverty-pay corporate employers with the revenue collected from low- and middle-income workers. Employers should be compelled to pay living wage rates.

Of course the problem of the working poor was in part created by the sham of New Labour's minimum wage legislation, which, far from troubling exploitative employers, functioned in their interests.

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