The BOE of 7 February published Royal Decree 145/2024, of 6 February, which sets the minimum interprofessional wage for 2024, to be applied from 1 January 2024, which represents an increase of 5% with respect to the minimum wage in 2023, so that, in 2024, the minimum full-time wage cannot be less than 15,876 euros.
FEDACOVA has been insisting on the arbitrary nature of a political decision that seriously disregards the situation of many activities linked to the agri-food sector that deserved, at least, a system of bonuses in Social Security contributions to cope with the cost of the increase in the minimum wage. Moreover, this series of increases, far above the evolution of inflation, and more than questionable, as they serve purposes unrelated to the evolution of productivity, breaks the balances achieved in collective bargaining and generates second-round effects on the evolution of prices, thus slowing down the economy and employment in our sector.
The regulation of the SMI in 2024 reiterates the rules that allow for absorption and compensation on an annual basis, as this is legally regulated. Therefore: The revision of the minimum interprofessional wage does not affect the structure or the amount of the remuneration tables of the collective agreements that companies have been applying, when such wages as a whole and in annual computation are higher than 15,876 euros in 2024.
All the salary payments that companies pay to their staff, such as incentives, voluntary improvements, seniority payments, etc… count towards reaching the 15,876 euros per year SMI in 2024. In other words: the comparison is not between the collective agreement tables and the SMI, but between all the salary payments made by companies and the SMI. When the sum of all the wages paid does not reach, in annual calculation, the annual SMI, it is when that amount must be guaranteed, for which it is recommended that a “SMI supplement” be added to the pay slip.
FEDACOVA will continue to work to defend the need for specific treatment for the activities most affected by the minimum wage in the agri-food sector, as there are many jobs and companies whose viability may be conditioned by these decisions, which still lack the consensus of all the social partners and condition the collective bargaining processes.
