The process to gradually hike the minimum salary to 703 euros ($777.04) over the next three years will start at the end of February

Almost 10 years after an economic crisis began, bringing austerity in return for three international bailouts of 326 billion euros ($360.32 billion,) the New Democracy government is planning to lift the minimum wage that had been brutally cut.

The process to gradually hike the minimum salary to 703 euros ($777.04) over the next three years will start at the end of February, said Kathimerini, with government spokesman Stelios Petsas repeating the party’s pledge.

It won’t happen all at once as the Labor Ministry is expected to have a series of consultations and committee reviews over the wage that had been slashed before being partially restored a year ago by the then-ruling Radical Left SYRIZA.

By March 31, all reports must be submitted to the consultation committee that will hold discussions with the social partners about the adjustment of the minimum wage before sending all data to the Center of Planning and Economic Research (KEPE), which will draft the final set of conclusions with a panel of five experts by May 31, the paper said.

In January, 2019, in a desperate bid to regain favor as he plunged in polls after reneging on promises to halt austerity and restore the minimum wage to its previous level, then-premier Alexis Tsipras said it would go up 11 percent, about half of what it was cut.

Read more at thenationalherald.com

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