29.12.2021

WILL THERE BE A SINGLE MINIMUM WAGE IN EUROPE?

MEPs have approved a mandate to start negotiations on a directive that will guarantee all workers in the EU a fair and adequate minimum wage. The project aims to set minimum requirements to ensure an income that enables a decent standard of living for workers and their families.

Parliament calls for the scope of collective bargaining to be strengthened and extended, obliging Member States in which less than 80% of workers are covered by these agreements to take active steps to promote this instrument.

According to one of the proposals, the minimum wage should be equal to 50% of the average wage for the country. For example - if for the third quarter in Bulgaria the average salary is estimated at BGN 1520, the minimum salary according to European rules should be around BGN 760 per month. At the moment it is BGN 650. The CITUB supports the European proposals. CITUB President Plamen Dimitrov commented:

"At the end of 2025, we expect to reach 67% of the average European income, now we are at about 55%. This means that the minimum wage should grow by about BGN 100 - 120 per year."

However, employers want each country to decide for itself, because there are enough national peculiarities that such a decision must take into account. The proposal of both Europe and CITUB the minimum wage is half of the average for the country and Stoyan Panchev from the Expert Club for Economics and Politics does not like:

"The minimum wage has a direct effect on the average wage. Linking it to another internal referral mechanism is a big mistake and could be an artificial supply to the wages themselves."

Ivan Neykov, director of the Balkan Institute for Labor and Social Policy, commented that although the EU is one of the richest regions in the world, 95 million Europeans live at risk of poverty:

"The social sphere is the sphere of shared competence of the EU, namely each country decides for itself and in some cases the EU could do something, ie have some powers to create regulations. A purely managerial European minimum wage would it had to be done in stages, not all at once."

For more than 15 years, the European Union has been looking for ways to harmonize minimum wages in the Member States, trying to find a balance between protecting workers, respecting the principles of competition and social justice. The European Parliament has given the green light to start negotiations with the Council on a directive that will guarantee all workers in the EU a fair and adequate minimum wage (MW). The regulation is expected to be adopted in the second half of next year.