Around 15 euros net more per month: this is the expected amount from the automatic revaluation of the minimum wage on January 1, which takes into account inflation (AFP/Archives/PHILIPPE HUGUEN)
Around 15 euros net more per month: this is the expected amount from the automatic revaluation of the minimum wage on January 1, which takes into account inflation, the latest figures for which were published on Friday.
According to an AFP calculation, confirmed by the Ministry of Labor, the minimum wage will be increased by 1.13% on January 1, bringing the gross hourly minimum wage to 11.65 euros, compared to 11.52 euros currently. These figures are based on inflation in November, which reached 3.5% over one year, according to INSEE.
For full-time work, the gross monthly minimum wage will thus be increased to 1766.92 euros, an increase of 19.72 euros per month.
In net terms, the minimum wage will increase from 1,383.08 euros to 1,398.69 euros, an increase of 15.61 euros net per month.
The government could choose to go beyond the automatic increase with a “nudge”, but this seems ruled out and there has not been one since 2012.
As every year, the panel of economists consulted before each increase came out against this possibility in its report delivered at the end of November, arguing about risks of negative effects “on the employment of vulnerable people”.
The CGT, for its part, underlined in a press release on Friday the urgency of a “significant increase in the minimum wage and all salaries” and reiterated its demand for a minimum wage of 2,000 euros gross.
In France, the minimum wage is the only salary indexed to inflation. Each year it benefits from a mechanical increase on January 1st which takes into account the weighted price increase for the 20% of households with the lowest incomes.
Revaluations also occur during the year as soon as inflation exceeds 2%.
This is the eighth increase since January 2021. At the start of the week, the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt noted that since that date, there have been three annual increases and four linked to inflation. “Incorporating the revaluation of January 1, 2021, we are on an increase of 13.5% in the minimum wage,” he indicated during a press point, before this new increase in January.
– More employees on minimum wage –
The number of employees paid the minimum wage has increased significantly: as of January 1, 2023, 3.1 million employees in the non-agricultural private sector benefited from the increase, or 17.3% of employees. They were 14.5% a year earlier, according to a Dares study published this week (AFP/Archives/PHILIPPE HUGUEN)
The number of employees paid the minimum wage has increased significantly: as of January 1, 2023, 3.1 million employees in the non-agricultural private sector benefited from the increase, or 17.3% of employees. They were 14.5% a year earlier, according to a Dares study published this week.
The proportion of beneficiaries is higher among part-time employees (38.3%, compared to 12.4% for full-time employees) and within very small businesses (26.8% in those with 1 to 9 employees, compared to 15% in the others).
Women are also over-represented among beneficiaries (57.3%).
As the minimum wage increases faster than the rest of wages, certain sector minimums are caught up. Others, rarer, are below the minimum wage for a longer period of time.
A lower minimum does not mean that employees are paid below the minimum wage: the employer must make up the gap.
But when several levels of seniority are caught up by the minimum wage, this generates a “flattening” of wages with an increased concentration of employees around the minimum wage.
In a press release, the Unsa union explains “that the minimum wage should only be an entry salary into professional life” and considers it “inadmissible for a worker to remain paid at the minimum wage for several years.”
Currently, according to a latest government report on Monday, 34 branches have minimums below the minimum wage, out of a total of some 170 branches. And this is without counting the January revaluation.
Applying pressure, Mr. Dussopt said that “half will be received at the ministry in the coming weeks”, citing for example the chemical industries branch or that of department stores.
© 2023 AFP
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