Miliband has made the case for raising the minimum wage by stating that one in five workers are classed as 'low paid' as they earn less than £7.71 an hour.
He claims that the rise would have a huge impact on these workers' standard of living and bring our minimum wage in line with that of other EU countries such as Germany but it would still be lower than in France.
Tim Worstall, writing for Forbes, objects to Mr Miliband's plans stating that they will lead to an increase in unemployment. He mentions that 13,000 jobs were lost when Tony Blair raised the minimum wage in 2005 and that the increased cost to companies would inevitably result in further job losses this time around.
A recent piece of research conducted on behalf of the Unite trade union disagrees with this view and suggests that raising the minimum wage by £1.50 would actually create at least 30,000 jobs and benefit around 4.6million workers. Not only that, but it also suggests that the public purse would grow by approximately £2.1bn due to the extra tax revenue. It states that the higher wages would encourage consumer spending and grow the economy in that way.
While accepting that some lower paid jobs would be lost due to reduced company profits, the report claims that more higher paid jobs would be created due to the economic stimulus provided by higher consumer spending. Therefore, suggesting that the impact of the rise would be broadly positive.
The true impact of Miliband's proposed rise will only come to light if he implements it after the next election. We may never know what the impact of such a rise would be but what is certain is that we will definitely not find out the impact of the Green Party's proposed £10 minimum wage any time soon.
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