Advancing Living Wages at the Second World Summit for Social Development
A collective call to action to UN Member States.
The 2025 UN Second World Summit for Social Development aims to foster inclusive social development and address key challenges to achieve well-being for all. A core pillar of this agenda is providing decent work for all.
Support the call to action HERE
A living wage is essential for building a more just and sustainable economy. It ensures that workers can earn enough to meet their basic needs. Beyond economic necessity, living wages are a powerful tool for strengthening social cohesion, reducing inequality, advancing human rights, and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. In the face of intersecting global challenges, a truly just transition is only possible when living wages become the norm – not the exception.
IDH and the World Benchmarking Alliance, together with UN Global Compact, the Business Commission to Tackle Inequality, Unilever, Shift, and the Platform Living Wage Financials, have issued a multi-stakeholder call to action urging UN Member States to prioritise living wages in the 2025 UN Second World Summit for Social Development (WSSD2) process and ensure their inclusion in the resulting political declaration.
Building on the 2024 International Labour Organisation’s formal agreement on living wages, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and Action 55(C) of the 2024 Pact for the Future, this letter calls on UN Member States to recognise and clarify the shared and distinct responsibility of both states and businesses in ensuring that all workers receive a living wage.
We invite all stakeholders to join the growing number of signatories from UN agencies, civil society and the private sector by supporting this call to action.
For questions, please contact Honore Johnson (johnson@idhtrade.org)