I am having no luck finding an independent international organization
(UN, World Bank, etc. or an NGO) who can provide a list of Living
Wages by country.  In other words, it takes $12.50 per hour in the US
to have decent housing, education, health, etc., while it takes $2.00
per hour in Thailand.  I can find government MINIMUM
wages, but I need to get a county list of LIVING wages or MIDDLE CLASS
wages.

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Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 15 Jun 2005 13:56 PDT

rpb227-ga,

You've asked a very intriguing question.  Comparing incomes and needs
in different countries is devilishly difficult for a whole host of
reasons that keep academics very busy.

The closest thing I can think of to what you're asking is WorldBank
compilations of "National Poverty Lines" data.

Each country sets its own definition of how much a person has to earn
to be above or below the poverty level...conceptually, this strikes me
as somewhat similar to a living wage line.  The WorldBank collects
this data, and regularly reports how many people in each country are
considered poor according to (at least) three criteria:

--international poverty line of $1/day income

--international poverty line of $2/day income

--national poverty lines as defined by each country

Unfortunately, the Bank only reports the number of people below the
line, but they don't regularly report what the value of the national
poverty line is -- at least, I haven't seen such reporting.

It's probably possible to find the national poverty line value by
searching for it one country at a time, but that obviously requires
more research than can be accomplished in the course of answering your
question.

I just wanted to offer up these thoughts -- I dont really have a
clarification request at the moment.  I'll let you know if I think of
any other options.

pafalafa-ga

In my opinion, you will not be able to find it, because one would
first have to define what is "decent" housing.

I know it's subjective, that's why I'm trying to find any independent
group that has at least started a baseline on this per country.

This is exactly the kind of problem I'm running into.  We are starting
a "living wage" apparel manufacturing company, and trying to determine
what wage should be paid in each country where we contract for
business to give consumers piece of mind that living wages are being
adhered to.  I was hoping to find a handy "chart" to tell us "you need
to pay $3.50 per hour in Cambodia" for example.  Perhaps what we need
to do is get a median income "chart" and define ourselves that living
wages are X% higher than median.  I don't think paying just above what
the World Bank calls poverty line would keep in the spirit of the
business.

It's also very hard to quantify what "living" is. In Cambodia, for
example, the minimum wage is about $35 a month if you work six days a
week in a garment factory. The middle class in nonexistent--the income
range jumps very quickly from the extremely poor to the criminally
rich, and I think it would be an enormous task to find a standard,
country by country and culture by culture, that could be turned into a
"living wage" formula, especially considering the demographic
limitations of the developing world.

rpb227-ga,
With your last comment, you have changed the question from a sweeping
statistical problem to identifying a fair wage in what must be a
fairly short list of countries  - if I understand correctly.

If that is the case, maybe posting a new question that addresses this
would get a better response.  If you could list the countries that are
of interest, someone could concentrate on those. As you know, you can
cancel a question at any time.

Good luck, Myoarin