Labor Minister on the Pay Law: We Want a Formula Comparable to the Current Law

Labor Minister Florin Manole spoke Thursday about the status of the draft wage law during a press briefing following the Cabinet meeting.

He announced that discussions on the new law are not only underway but also well advanced, involving a working group composed of representatives from the Chancellery and the Ministry of Finance, with the support of the World Bank, which is serving as a consultant for this project.

“Yes, discussions are not only underway but also well advanced. In a working group with the Chancellery and the Ministry of Finance, with the support of the World Bank, which is acting as a consultant for this project. Yes, we want a formula comparable to the current salary law, in which the president would have the highest salary, but I don’t yet have details to share with you. “We’ll do that as the project moves forward,” Manole stated.

He also explained the mechanism of the salary scale under consideration, which would be tied to the minimum wage set to rise to 4,325 lei as of July 1, though he noted that the benchmark would not be strictly the minimum wage.

“It is true that one of the scenarios under consideration involves a scale from 1 to 8, but I must make an important clarification, because it is very necessary. Even if the benchmark will be comparable to the minimum wage in terms of amount, in the next salary law there will be no direct correlation, or it will be a reference index, so to speak, not the minimum wage. This is a way to decouple the salary law from any foreseeable legal increases in the minimum wage. Of course, this is without anyone in the public sector earning less than the minimum wage, because no one in Romania should earn less than the minimum wage and does not earn less than the minimum wage. It’s just that, once again, the benchmark will not be the minimum wage, but an index comparable to the minimum wage in terms of amount,” the minister clarified.

Regarding the average wage increases, Florin Manole said that the final data is not yet available and that the priority is to reorganize the pay scales.

“We do not currently have the analysis from the Ministry of Finance on this matter. The priority has been to reorganize the hierarchy of the annexes, because at this time, in practice, due to numerous amendments to the salary law, there is a disorder in the pay scales, and the goal is to reorganize these scales,” said Florin Manole.