In a week in which there was not much good news from the social side (bad and predictable poverty indicators), the evolution of the wages allows us to assert that a slow, but persistent recovery is taking place.
In the month of July 2024, the last one with available data, Aggregate salaries managed to grow by 7.5%, well above the inflation experienced (4.2%).
The salient data of the month is the powerful increase in the salaries of unregistered workers (15.1%), who have been the most punished during the last year and a half.
Thus, the trend of improvement in purchasing power is consolidated. July was the fourth consecutive month in which total wages grew above inflation.
Between January and July 2024, aggregate salaries recovered 11.2 percentage points compared to inflation. However, there is a lot of heterogeneity depending on the type of employment.
Private sector salaries
Registered private workers recovered 18.8 points and are very close to reaching parity compared to the purchasing power of July 2022.
Salaries in the unregistered sector
The informal private sector has recovered 8.5 points so far in 2024 but still has a long way to go, taking into account the depth of its previous decline.
State sector salaries
For their part, public sector employees offer a slower recovery dynamic, in line with the fiscal austerity policies that are being imposed (although in July their real situation improved, in the semester they continue with a net loss of 2, 1%).
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What can happen to salaries?
The deterioration process, which began during the second half of 2023 with the notable decoupling of the wages of unregistered workers, deepened sharply in December of last year with the inflationary jump.
It was precisely at that moment when the loss of purchasing power of the wages It also reached the formal sectors, a trend that began to reverse in the second quarter of this year.
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The present trend towards recovery can be consolidated only to the extent that the downward path of inflation is sustained (which has good prospects) and more robust signs of recovery of the economy and, therefore, of demand for employment (even without intense signals).
VDC Consulting Director.
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Source: Ambito
