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Spain’s left-wing coalition government approved an 8% increase in the national minimum wage this election year, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez told lawmakers in the Senate on Tuesday.
The increase, the fifth under Sánchez’s term, represents an additional 100 dollars a month, bringing the new minimum wage to 1,259 euros in 12 tranches a year.
“In 1999, a Spaniard needed to dedicate four annual salaries to buy a flat. Today, he needs to dedicate more than double, eight annual salaries,” Sánchez affirmed before the Upper House.
The Ministry of Labor said in a statement that the minimum wage had increased by 47% in the last five years.
The measure is produced when average inflation reached 8.4% in 2022, and is part of a plan agreed within the framework of the coalition pact with the left-wing party United We Can to raise the net minimum wage to 60% of the wage country’s monthly average at the end of his four-year term.
“Thanks to the agreement with the unions, we make effective one of the great commitments of the legislature: to reach at least 60% of the average wage,” Labor Minister Yolanda Díaz, of Unidas Podemos, reacted on Twitter.
Prior to the announcement, the Government met with union representatives to inform them of the increase, but the main employers did not attend the meeting and rejected the increase after defending a rise of only 4%. Despite this, they must abide by the rise.
Unai Sordo, general secretary of the CCOO, said that some 2.5 million people would benefit from the measure, especially women, youth, workers with temporary contracts and workers in the service and agricultural sectors.
The municipal elections will be held in Spain in May and the general elections at the end of 2023. This Tuesday saw the first face-to-face between Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo, leader of the opposition, in the middle of the electoral campaign.
with Reuters
