The minimum wage was automatically revalued on Sunday May 1 under the effect of inflation, but this puts companies under pressure. The decryption of Fanny Guinochet.
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The two million employees paid the minimum wage will earn 33 euros net more per month. This is in addition to the increase they had already had in the fall. They will receive a salary of just over 1,300 euros net monthly. This represents a total increase of almost 6% in a few months. But for the other employees, on the other hand, all those who are above the Smic, there is no systematic increase while they suffer like the others the price increases.
>> Rise in the Smic: “It’s a joke”, judge the employees concerned for whom “every penny counts”
This will pose problems of purchasing power. These employees will be tempted to ask their bosses for salary increases. Especially those who until then were barely above the minimum wage. Because with this new increase, they therefore find themselves at the same level: the minimum wage has mechanically caught up with the level of the lowest wages.
This increase upsets all the grids, suddenly, in certain branches – such as the textile industry or the hairdressing -, these are five or six levels which will pass under the minimum wage. In others, there is only 50 euros difference between the minimum wage and the highest salary. Employers are thus concerned about possible social tensions. Some bosses wonder how they are going to keep up financially with these claims.
Among civil servants too, this rise in the minimum wage promises to cause a stir. As in the private sector, the increase puts pressure on the state employer because, there too, it crushes the salary grid. Emmanuel Macron has promised, for his second term, negotiations in the public service with a complete reform of the remuneration of agents. He also promised to raise the index point – which serves as the basis for the salaries of civil servants – but he did not say by how much and that is the whole point.
Will this level compensate for inflation? And suddenly, what about agents who are just above the equivalent of the minimum wage? In any case, it could be expensive for public finances because it is estimated that a 1% increase in the remuneration of agents costs two billion euros. Suffice to say that these negotiations promise to be particularly tense.