Laurence Edwards calculates what a jar of honey would cost if 50,000 bees earned the UK minimum wage of £9.50 per hour. A single jar would run about £172 million. The thought experiment combines real wage data with the absurdity of paying insects.
If you paid every single bee in a beehive the national minimum wage, how much do you think the colony of bees would earn in a single year, and how much would a single jar of honey cost? Let's crunch some numbers and some facts. A colony of bees starts off small in the winter, and the population peaks around July. Summer bees only tend to live for between 4 to 6 weeks, and winter bees can live for up to 6 months. Regardless of this, the colony always maintains a steady number of bees to be able to perform all of the critical tasks within the hive. On average, there are between 10,000 and 100,000 bees in a hive at any point For the sake of argument, let's settle on an even average for the season of 50,000 bees at all times. The next thing we need to establish is, are they full-time or part-time workers? There must be a simple test to see if the bees are working or shirking. We can't give them their full salary for 24 hours a day if they're off playing Hive of Duty or sipping pollen coladas. Sorry. A simple test. Have you ever opened up a hive at nighttime? What happens? You generally get stung and attacked. The bees are on guard and not happy. Those bees aren't shirking, they're always on standby duty and should be getting paid 24 hours a day. Even in winter, they may not be out foraging, but they are keeping the queen and brood warm, carrying out essential winter maintenance activities. But here's the big question: how much should they be paid for their labour? Honeybees work hard. They collect pollen, rear brood, produce wax, clear out dead bodies, attack intruders, and most importantly, they are willing to sacrifice their lives in order to protect the wellbeing of the collective unit. I'd say they are very well deserving of their national living wage, which for 2022 in the UK is £9.50 per hour. There are 8,760 hours in a single calendar year. This is a simple case of multiplication. 50,000 bees times 8,760 hours times £9.50 per hour equals £4.9932 billion. The latest BBKA honey yield survey stated the average yield per colony was 28.5 pounds of honey. That equates to a total cost per jar of £172 million. If you appreciate the hard work and effort of the honeybees, hit the like button, give them a thumbs up.
