Venezuela Maduro finalizes a rise in the Minimum Wage, the fourth lowest in the world: $5.25 per month

Venezuelan workers expectantly await the imminent rise in the minimum wage, so far one of the worst on the planet, only surpassed by Uganda ($1

Venezuela Maduro finalizes a rise in the Minimum Wage, the fourth lowest in the world: $5.25 per month

Venezuelan workers expectantly await the imminent rise in the minimum wage, so far one of the worst on the planet, only surpassed by Uganda ($1.6), Burundi ($1.8) and Rwanda ($2.5). Both public employees and pensioners, who number around ten million according to opposition estimates, currently receive $5.25 a month, far from the $57 a month that the United Nations establishes as the minimum wage for extreme poverty.

In what was the richest country in Latin America and the one that still has the largest oil reserves on the planet, these workers are not even enough to cover for three days with their minimum wage what the UN determines for a whole month. For the World Bank, any person who receives less than 64 dollars a month is in extreme poverty.

By contrast, the average wage in the private sector was $139 a week during the last quarter of last year. All this in a country with very high prices, almost double that of neighboring Colombia.

As is traditional, May Day would be the most appropriate framework for Nicolás Maduro to announce the increase, which different observers place between 30 and 60 dollars a month, despite the protests and demands of teachers, health personnel, retirees and unions. for months. Different unions, including some socialists, have called for this Monday a unitary march called "great day of national protest", in demands for decent wages and pensions. In parallel, Chavismo will surround Maduro in his usual concentration on Workers' Day.

"I am convinced, there are important announcements," said the representative and former revolutionary minister Oswaldo Vera. Diosdado Cabello, number two of the revolution and vice president of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) has already announced his full support for what Maduro decides.

On the contrary, Henrique Capriles, candidate of the centrist Primero Justicia (PJ) party for the opposition primaries in October, has warned in recent hours that "there will be no salary increase and they will continue with the bonus policy, something absolutely discretionary No one can live with 130 bolivars ($5.25)."

Chavismo maintains its strategy of delivering bonds to different groups of the population to maintain social and political control over them. The one that was granted to women on March 8 for their International Day was just over three dollars. So arbitrary is this policy that the government decided to hand out another bonus in March, called co-responsibility and training, of around $200 for positions of trust.

The great dilemma is that everything indicates that the increase that the government will make will not satisfy almost anyone in the country, not even the International Labor Organization (ILO), which was betting on a large salary increase that reaches up to 400 dollars. . The current minimum wage does not even cover 1% of the family shopping basket, which the prestigious Center for Documentation and Analysis of Workers (Cenda) puts at 510 dollars a month.

The economic drift so far this year, compared to the relative growth of 2022, does not play in favor of the "people's president" either. Economic activity has fallen by 8.3% during the first quarter, heralding an imminent recession, while year-on-year inflation is above 500%, the highest in the world. Business sales have fallen 13.3% while the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) has already earned 311 million dollars to stop the depreciation of the bolivar, according to the Venezuelan Finance Observatory.

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