Wages in Croatia must rise because nearly 70 per cent of employees earn less than the average, participants in a roundtable hosted by the Science Union and the Preporod Union stressed on Tuesday.
"According to April data, the average net wage was around 1550 euros, but nearly 70 per cent of employees earn less than the average. The question arises as to how we can retain workers in Croatia, particularly the highly educated, with such low wages," pointed out Izabela-Delfa Mišić, an economist with the Independent Croatian Trade Unions (Nezavisni hrvatski sindikati).
In public services, education and science are among the biggest losers of the wage reform and the new coefficient system, assessed Sebastijan Troskot from the Preporod Union, although more than 80 per cent of highly educated employees work within this system.
Matija Kroflin from the Science Union stated that the Government has room to increase all wages, including through tax relief on labour, which, according to him, is evidenced by data on the filling of local budgets. From the union, they stressed that the fiscal capacity of the state budget allows for increases for public and state officials, whose real incomes are being reduced by inflation this year, and that private employers also have room to continue raising wages.
"Reducing state spending and raising wages below inflation slows the economy. Such policy carries risks, especially if additional external or geopolitical shocks occur," warned Viktor Viljevac from the Faculty of Economics in Zagreb.
Roundtable participants also criticised the Government's approach to collective bargaining, which they assessed as destructive and a poor example for private employers, noting that negotiations are often merely a formality. Darko Šeperić from the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions of Croatia (Savez samostalnih sindikata Hrvatske) warned that demands for fiscal discipline, deregulation, and belt-tightening are re-emerging at the national and European levels.
