There are some magical places in Europe where the crisis won’t last, and inflation is an opportunity to earn more. These are selected points in Brussels, Luxembourg, Strasbourg – places where EU institutions are located. Those lucky enough to work with them can expect further increases, and backwards. Due to inflation, EU officials will receive further increases counting backwards – the first was in July with an adjustment from January 2022, and now with an adjustment from mid-year. This also includes compensation for the lack of wage increases during the pandemic. Eurocracy is now bringing them back in times of crisis.
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Big money
On average, the wages of Eurocrats increase by 7% every six months. The lowest salaries increase by 214 euros and the highest by 1,483 euros per month. The highest paid EU civil servants can currently earn up to EUR 22,646 (approximately PLN 105,000) per month. Members of the European Parliament form a separate category. They will receive an increase of 700 euros and their salary will be 10,495 euros. Of course you also have to add the allowances for civil servants and MEPs, travel allowances, allowances for work abroad, removals, children, furniture, etc. – so many items that only the most skilled accountants can figure it all out.
Commissioners are at the top of the earning pyramid. The pot has of course been broken by the President of the European Commission. Her salary has been increased by € 2,044 and will exceed € 30,000 per month for the first time. Ursula von der Leyen receives 31,250,000 euros per month and together with allowances, for example for living in Brussels, almost 36,000 euros per month. He earns more than the President of the United States. Ordinary commissioners like Jourova or Wojciechowski receive 26,000 euros, plus of course nice extras, depending on what they come up with.
All of these increases were automatic, as wages were indexed to inflation rates in Belgium and Luxembourg. Some Eurocrats, such as Cristiano Sebastiani, head of the union of EU civil servants, argued that this was not enough, as inflation in Belgium exceeded 12% in October, the highest in nearly 50 years. However, Eurocracy had to hold back a bit, apparently the Commission was even against this indexation, but although it fought with all its might not to earn more, the increases were unstoppable. All this took place at a time when strikes and wage protests were taking place all over Belgium.
In Brussels we have a time warp and two realities. One is in Belgium itself and the other is the world, namely the European Union with its institutions. A Belgian and an EU national live in the same Brussels, but everything counts differently for them. Pensions, salaries, premiums, allowances. Such an ordinary Belgian can even pay 52.6 percent. income tax, and an EU citizen from the same street no more than 20 percent. Even the Posting of Workers Directive does not apply to Eurocrats. They are a special kind of people.
The EU split of reality and even itself is also visible, for example, in the Netherlands, which is threatened by the collapse of the pension system. Inflation is practically the same as in Poland, but the interest rates maintained by the European Central Bank are at a very low level. Inflation eats up premiums and pension capital. Of course, the ECB cannot raise interest rates, because then Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece and France would not be able to service their debts. From a financial point of view, being in the Eurozone is like riding a rickety, broken rollercoaster, which the Croats also find out about. The euro, which supposedly protects against higher inflation, is now becoming the main driver in Croatia.
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The problem with German pensions
Also under the EU, and especially the eurozone, pension systems are ticking, as the German publicist Christoph Birnbaum described in his book “Pension Lie”. By 2040, the cost of paying pensions in Germany could rise to a trillion euros a year. We argue about money from KPO, – such a “miserable PLN 158” billion, which we will pay back by repaying the loan, increasing taxes and contributions, while the EU’s pension obligations towards its employees (about 60,000 people) and EU pensioners in mid-2022 amounted to PLN 122.5 billion. According to Bild, that was 6 billion euros more than at the beginning of 2021. However, Eurocrats have nothing to worry about. At least as long as the EU exists. Their pensions are fully paid directly from the EU budget.
The European Union is in crisis. In many Member States, the energy crisis is turning into a financial and economic crisis. Incidentally, the internal contradictions of the very structure of the Union, and in particular the euro area, are revealed. What agility is needed to reconcile the repayment of the gigantic debt burden of Spain, Italy or France with the fight against the enormous inflation as in the Netherlands or the Baltic States. In Croatia, extraordinary measures are being taken to contain price increases associated with the introduction of the euro. Problems to be solved everywhere, the people of Europe are struggling with the consequences of the crisis. But right next to it is a world without cares and sacrifices. The sovereign kingdom of Union and its happy and carefree inhabitants.
Source: wPolityce