EU Sources - Real minimum wages increased in 2024 - January 31, 2024

While the prospects for minimum wage workers in early 2023 looked gloomy – with rates in many EU Member States struggling to offset rising prices – the new year brings better news. National minimum wages were raised significantly in most countries, both in nominal and real terms, and also when examined in the context of the entire period since 2022, when inflation rates started to surge. Although in 2023 many Member States raised minimum wage rates substantially in nominal terms and at an unprecedented pace, in many cases this was barely enough to compensate workers for the extraordinary rise in prices that started in late 2021. With inflation rates remaining high well into 2023 in a number of Member States – especially among the countries that joined the EU in 2004 and later – minimum wage workers saw a decline in their purchasing power throughout the year. However, 2024 brought a turning of the tide in many countries: substantial nominal increases outpaced inflation in many countries with a national minimum wage.

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For more information, please contact Paul de Beer or Oana Ciuca, De Burcht (Scientific Bureau for the Dutch Trade Union Movement) p.t.debeer@uva.nl or the Head of communications at the ETUI, Mehmet Koksal mkoksal@etui.org. For previous full issues of the Collective bargaining newsletter please visit https://www.etui.org/Newsletters/Collective-bargaining-newsletter or consult the archive with all articles in our database at www.cbnarchive.eu.
You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org.