Friday, 22nd August 2008

Minimum wage ranks midway among 20 EU states

The national minimum wage in Malta ranked 12th lowest in a comparative table of 20 EU countries drawn up by the European Industrial Relations Observatory.

Malta's monthly minimum wage for adults, at €601.90, was higher last year than in Slovenia, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania and Bulgaria. It was, however, lower than that in Greece, Spain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK, Ireland and Luxembourg.

Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Cyprus and Austria were not included in the study.

The monthly minimum wage was highest in Luxembourg (€1,570.28), followed by Ireland (€1,499.33) and the UK (€1,398.80). The lowest was in Bulgaria (€92.03), followed by Romania (€131.92) and Latvia (€171.40).

The rates for Luxembourg were for unqualified workers. Qualified workers received a wage that was 20 per cent higher.

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Article © Allied Newspapers Ltd., printed on Monday, November 23, 2009. This article is for personal use only, and should not be distributed.

Comments

Joz Camilleri (on 22/8/08)

Doesn't the Inspectorate at the ETC check out whether immigrants working in road and construction sites are being paid adequately? Are they being underpaid? I have been living in Italy far too long to see that, very often, employing immigrants irregularly benefits employers only who underpay and avoid paying contributions and NI, insurance, etc. On the other hand many employed in this manner do not complain because they are earning far more than they did in their country.

The crux of the matter lies here... how should these people be employed and who supervises their employment? Is this a temporary contract renewable ever so often or what? Aren't there any rules and regulations on this matter? Are the Maltese who wish to be employed suffering because of this discrepancy?

A few answers would be quite welcome at this stage... and, as Mr. Carl Pol has already pointed out, if there are underpaid workers, then the situation of the employed (even if they are immigrants) is far from rosy because this stagnates economic growth and financial power.

A Daley (on 22/8/08)

Oh, so now we rank midway do we?

Change of headline is it?

Sounds better, does it?

So where do we rank in AVERAGE WAGE?

Carl Pol (on 22/8/08)

Another statistic not worth the paper it is written on because every Maltese knows that in reality a huge block of Maltese workers (read youngsters and foreigners are being employed outside the system at anything between one Lira to 1.5 lira that would really make the min. wage at somewhere between 373 Euro to 559 Euro. And above all these people have no rights. If they are foreign workers they have tp pay for medical care because as soon as you go to Mater Dei they ask for the pay slip .....It is not their choice because the employers in most cases refuse to employ people on legal bases to save the NI contribution. So lets call a spade a spade and admit that these statistics are grossly incorrect...and everyone knows this all the way into the highest institution of the country... Thank you