Minimum Wage Hike from BGN 340 to BGN 400 Will Not Hit Business Sector - Minister

Yordan Hristoskov, Bulgaria's caretaker Minister of Labor and Social Policy, photo by BGNES

Yordan Hristoskov, Bulgaria's caretaker Minister of Labor and Social Policy, has suggested that a minimum wage hike from BGN 340 to BGN 400 will not harm the business sector.

In a Thursday interview for private TV station bTV, Hristoskov said that it was high time to do something about Bulgaria still being at the bottom of the EU ranking by guaranteed minimum income.

He insisted that it was time to take steps to curb the share of envelope wages, currently at 30%, on which no social security contributions and taxes were paid.

Bulgaria's caretaker Labor Minister rejected claims of employers that a minimum wage hike would boost unemployment, stressing that the minimum wage had nearly doubled in the past few years, while the unemployment rate had remained normal.

He reiterated his call for introducing a mechanism for the automatic calculation of the minimum wage rate.

Hristoskov was adamant that there were no plans for an increase in social security contributions by 7.3 percentage points, adding that proposals for an increase by 1-2 percentage points as of 2015 were being discussed.

He urged employers and trade unions to reach agreement on the minimum social security incomes for 2015 in the ongoing talks on the matter.

Hristoskov said that the priority task for Bulgarian government bodies was to secure shelter for the people whose homes had been destroyed in the floods in the past few months.

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