Wages will increase little in 2025

On Thursday, during his farewell speech, Bruno Le Maire explained that salaries would be the subject of the next 25 years. In the meantime, we can wonder what the increases will be in 2025, and we already have some answers.

On Thursday, September 12, the resigning Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire organized a “thank you speech”, without waiting for the transfer of power to his future successor. During this speech, he mentioned the importance of the question of salaries, which will remain the subject of the next 25 years according to him.

For the near future, we can find some elements of response for the evolution of these salaries. For example,The study by recruitment firm PageGroup, which has just been published, shows that in 2025, this change will not be significant. HR directors say that their average budgets are increasing by 1.5 or 2% for salaries next year, compared to between 3 and 3.5% in 2024.

At the same time, inflation is falling: we have fallen below the 2% per year mark. The bosses are saying that the pressure of price increases will be less strong. More broadly, the economic context worries them, which is also why they are putting their foot on the brake. Not to mention that with the change of government and the spiralling deficit, they fear tax increases.

In fact, the bosses preferred to remain cautious. Not only will the envelopes planned for salaries next year be less generous than this year, but they will be very targeted. Enough to generate social tensions while the mandatory negotiations are about to open. The unions already note that the main conflicts in companies are due to remuneration, and they estimate that a 2% increase is not enough.

Since 1.5 to 2% represents an average, some sectors will benefit more than others. Those working in luxury, aeronautics, chemistry, energy, keep good margins for negotiation. Then, it also depends on the profession: in IT, finance, banking, cybersecurity, data processing, artificial intelligence, engineers will have no trouble seeing their pay slips increase. Similarly, holders of certain skills that manufacturers are fighting over – in logistics or project management for example, can hope to obtain more than 10% increase.

Another example, niche positions such as climate managers or CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) officers, which are today specialized functions requiring good legal and legislative knowledge, will see their salaries increase more than the average. On the other hand, it will be more difficult for administrative functions or those in communication and advertising… For these as for others, we note that it is by changing companies that we often obtain the most significant increase.