The negotiation to raise the minimum wage has begun. The Ministry of Labor sat down this Wednesday with the unions and the majority employers’ associations to try to agree on the increase in the SMI in 2025, which now stands at 1,134 gross euros per month in 14 payments. Labor has proposed increasing it by 50 euros, to 1,184 euros per month, the CCOO and UGT unions have proposed that it be around 1,200 euros per month and the employers have not presented a proposal for the moment.
This is the first social dialogue meeting for the increase in the minimum wage that has served to present the initial positions of the parties. The table will meet again next week, on January 22, in which the Secretary of State for Labor, Joaquín Pérez Rey, has trusted that the employers will present their position and an agreement can be reached.
The second vice president and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz, assured this Wednesday morning that “there is room for agreement.” “I sincerely believe it and we are going to work for the agreement,” he maintained.
Work proposes an SMI of 1,184 euros per month
The Government’s objective remains to place the minimum wage at 60% of the average wage, as recommended by the European Social Charter. According to the commission of experts that advises the Ministry of Labor, there are two possibilities to reach this reference, depending on two contemplated scenarios of average salary: an increase of 3.4% or 4.1%, which would place the SMI at 1,173 or 1,184 gross euros per month, respectively.
The high band of this proposal is the one that the Ministry of Labor has opted for, as Vice President Yolanda Díaz announced this weekend.
Thus, it represents an increase of 4.4%, 50 euros more per month, 700 euros more per year, which in Labor highlights that it can make the difference between “a better diet, turning on the heating more or less, greater well-being or a greater wage poverty,” explained Joaquín Pérez Rey.
The unions propose 1,200 euros
CCOO and UGT have asked at the table for an increase of “between 5% and 6%”, which represents a minimum wage “around 1,200 euros” per month, explained the union negotiators, Maricruz Vicente (CCOO) and Fernando Luján (UGT).
Thus, the unions demand an increase higher than that proposed by the Ministry of Labor and the recommendation of the Commission of experts to place the minimum wage at 60% of the average wage, of which they are part.
The representatives of CCOO and UGT have explained that in their opinion the 4.4% increase proposed by Labor does not guarantee that the goal of the European Social Charter will be met “if there is going to be a tax burden on minimum wages,” they indicated. Maricruz Vicente. However, the committee’s report does consider that this objective is met, since it calculates the goal of 60% of the average salary in net terms.
The unions have asked the Government to clarify whether the minimum wage will be exempt from personal income tax or not, a “tricky” debate that has opened in recent days and that also generates differences between the unions themselves. While in UGT they flatly reject taxation, in CCOO they limit themselves to demanding that 60% of the average salary be guaranteed in net terms.
In the Ministry of Yolanda Díaz they explain that their position is to adapt the exempt minimum so that the SMI continues without being taxed in personal income tax, as has been done to date, but they indicate that “it is the responsibility of the Treasury.” CCOO and UGT have demanded that Labor, although it is not their responsibility, present at the table what the Government’s decision is on this matter.
Waiting for the bosses
“We have attended the meeting on the SMI, in which we have listened to the proposal of the Ministry of Labor and now we will proceed to analyze it internally with a view to a new meeting next week,” indicate sources from the CEOE employers’ association. The forecast is that businessmen will meet internally on January 22 and, in the afternoon, they will go to the social dialogue table with a position.
Although Labor assures that “there is room for agreement,” union sources consider it very difficult for the employers to enter into an agreement. Firstly, due to the climate of tension with Labor due to the employers’ rejection of the reduction in working hours, which they accuse of “interference” in collective bargaining. And, secondly, because the increase in the minimum wage is an issue that the CEOE has already ruled out negotiating in previous years.
Employers, especially those of small businesses (Cepyme) and the self-employed (ATA), complain about the significant increases in the minimum wage in recent years, which they insist put many companies in danger.
In Labor and the unions, however, they point out that the minimum wage must continue to increase in a context in which business margins have increased more than wages and are at maximum levels, and in which the increase in the minimum wage has been accompanied by a push of employment and the economy in Spain, which are leading European statistics.
Source: www.eldiario.es
