Detox. No, there are no salaries below the minimum wage as announced by Emmanuel Macron.

Where does the intox come from?

During his interview on March 22 on France 2 and TF1, the President of the Republic said he wanted to “hear what our compatriots who are demonstrating are telling us, [non pas sur les retraites]but [sur le travail] who should pay”. And to invite the “social partners to reengage very quickly with us [sur le salaire minimum]because, he explained, “you have lots of branches that continue to pay people below the legal minimum wage.”

Why is this wrong?

The indexation of the minimum wage to inflation has led to a sharp increase in the minimum wage in recent years. It has thus increased by 11% in three years. Automatic increases occurred a few months apart due to the sharp rise in prices. Unlike wage negotiations in professional branches, which take place once a year. Result, recalls the Dares, the statistical unit of the Ministry of Labor, in a note in February: “It may be necessary to wait sometimes a year, or even more, for changes in the economic context, including increases in the minimum wage, be taken into account in these negotiations.”

At the end of 2022, 57 branches out of the 171 most important, i.e. 33% of them, thus presented a minimum below the minimum wage.
Contrary to what the President of the Republic says, there are not “heaps of branches which continue to pay people below the minimum wage”. Simply because it is forbidden. People whose minima are below the minimum wage are automatically raised to the minimum wage. And collective negotiations between social partners are regular, without waiting, as Emmanuel Macron suggests, for an “invitation” from the President.