2024-01-01 11:00:04
Like every year, the minimum wage is increased on January 1 to take inflation into account. The minimum growth salary therefore increases from 1,383.08 euros net monthly (for 35 hours of work) to 1,398.69 euros, an increase of 15.61 euros (+ 1.13%). The gross amount of the minimum wage amounts to 1,766.92 euros, as specified in a decree published on December 20 in Official newspaper. The ritual question, at the end of each year, is to know whether the executive will choose, as it has the possibility, to give a “boost” to this legal revaluation. For the 2024 edition, the omens do not seem favorable, despite the impact of the inflationary shock on the most fragile households in 2022 and 2023.
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In its annual report published on November 28, 2023, the group of experts on the minimum wage, chaired by Gilbert Cet – appointed at the end of October at the head of the Pension Orientation Council –, “recommends refraining from any boost on the minimum wage on January 1, 2024”. Indeed, according to the committee, “the only automatic revaluation mechanisms preserve the purchasing power of the minimum wage in view of the increase in the consumer price index”.
The minimum wage, the only remuneration legally indexed to inflation, was in fact revalued seven times between January 1, 2021 and May 1, 2023. In total, it increased by 13.5% over this period.
A helping hand, Mr. Ce explained, “is not effective in fighting poverty”. This is more due to the “low number of hours worked and family configuration” of the most modest categories of the population, estimates the group of experts. Nearly six in ten people on the minimum wage are women (57%) and, according to Dares, more than one in four women (26.7%) were employed part-time in 2022.
Remote remuneration
The unions, for their part, rather point to the sharp decline in remuneration around the minimum wage: on January 1, 2023, more than 17% of French employees were paid on the basis of the minimum wage, compared to 14.5% a year earlier. “3.1 million employees are paid the minimum wage, compared to 2.5 million last year”, declared Sophie Binet to AFP after the publication of the report. And the general secretary of the CGT pleads for a minimum wage of 2,000 euros gross.
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The executive suggests that a boost would risk further accentuating the “catch-up” of which many employees are victims who were paid just above the minimum wage, and who today find themselves at the same level of remuneration as their less qualified colleagues, or who have less seniority than them. Another consequence, the minimum remuneration set in sectoral collective agreements is increasingly outpaced by the minimum wage. According to the Ministry of Labor, today 34 professional branches (out of 170) have minimum wages below the minimum wage. Some of them will be received by the Ministry of Labor at the beginning of 2024 to try to remedy this situation.
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