Minimum wages will rise by 19.8% in the new Iranian year that started on March 21, as per the decision made in the last session of Supreme Labor Council. After a dozen sessions, the representatives of workers, employers and the government agreed to increase last year’s (March 2017-18) minimum wage from 9.29 million rials (about $185.8) to 11.14 million rials ($222.8) this year.
In doing so, Minister of Cooperatives, Labor and Social Welfare Ali Rabiei says the country’s minimum wages will increase by around 132% compared with the current inflation rate of 8.3%. Wage increases for the rest of the workers are yet to be decided by the council, Mehr News Agency quoted Rabiei as saying. Although all parties believed that workers’ wages should exceed the inflation rate, the representatives of workers stressed their will to ensure that wage hikes will be based on last year’s living wage—a theoretical wage level that allows an individual to afford adequate shelter, food and other necessities.
The living wage for a 3.3-member household last year (March 2017-18) was set at 26.7 million rials ($534) by the council, close to 1.81 million rials ($36.2) more than that of the year before.
Food and beverage penditures accounted for 25.7% of the figure and non-food items made up 74.3% of the households’ expenditures. It is three years now that the council sets the living wage of Iranian households for the following year’s wage hike.
