This 2022 became an ‘annus horribilis’ for pocket The vast majority of workers in Spain. It’s the worst the 21st century has ever been, according to data updated this Tuesday on collective agreements signed by the Department of Labor. This The salaries agreed with the collective bargaining agreement between employers and unions closed the year with an increase of 2.8%.Three times lower than the 2022 average inflation (8.4%). Referring to the latest CPI data for December, it is 5.8%, the decline in real wages is less, but still the deepest as statistics are available.
in 2022 resisted Duty despite the slowdown At the end of the year with 470,000 net job creation. The business structure resisted as best it could and recorded at least 0.2% company destruction (mainly with less than 5 employees). But what did not resist the greatest inflation since the 1980s they feesearly pagans of the current price crisis into which major Western economies are plunged.
Spanish workers have reached 2022 after a decade of stagnant wages, with inflation and wage increases continuing at roughly equal rates year-over-year. Again, shot lightshot has been Shopping cart and shot gasoline and this unstable balance has been swept hard and the financial health of families has taken a beating. Not all of them shared the same fate. For example, profits for Ibex 35 companies have increased eight times more than salaries since the outbreak of covid.
2022 is releasing a few ‘firsts’, it will be one of them the houses he entered pension they will not lose their purchasing power -The government has protected them by law according to the CPI- and yes -with exceptions- it will protect those who depend on the salary. Civil servants will also lose purchasing power, albeit slightly less than their private sector counterparts. In 2022, their salaries increased by 3.5%, so they lost five points of real wages. A decline similar to that experienced by wage earners who earned the inter-professional minimum wage (SMI) increased by 3.6%.
Collective bargaining has improved at two rates over the past 2022. In the first half of the year, the majority of expired collective agreements were not renewed, so unions and employers will be able to close a collective agreement. salary contract then it will guide innovations on a sectoral basis. However, agreement between CEOE, CCOO and UGT was not possible, the parties conflicted over the obligation to tie the revaluation of wages according to the evolution of the CPI.
At this point, the CEOE closed the tape to prevent companies from revising their payrolls upwards at the end of the year and denied any link to inflation. And this obstacle prevented the 3.5% increase reference that the parties had agreed on beforehand. Finally, the result resulted in a lower average increase of 2.8%, which the Department of Labor gave this Friday.
Growing inequality between sectors
Salary deal failed, centers and employers stranded erratic results various agreements in the last period of the year. With a salary increase of 4% without a salary review clause, the specifications for the Barcelona hotel industry have little to do with metal from the same province, which would have increased to about 7% thanks to the inclusion of the clause. And salary inequalities have skyrocketed this year, with just 30% of workers being met with a pay rise of over 3%.
Paradoxically, the industries that have seen unprecedented benefits growth in recent months are the ones that are accepting the worst salary conditions with their workers this 2022. This is true for the banking sector at 1.2% and 1.9%, respectively, and for the energy sector, at 1.9%. Lead the queue in collective bargaining by unions. In a report released last July, the Bank of Spain warned: half of the big companies were expanding their profit margins He pointed to companies dedicated to the extraction of crude oil despite the price crisis and in particular.