Wage growth in Romania drops in the single-digit area in January

The average net wage in Romania rose 9.7% y/y to RON 5,328 (EUR 1,070) in January, marking the slowest annual real growth rate (+4.7% y/y) since May 2023.

Wages are expected to lose momentum through 2025, after the 4.4% and 7.7% advance, in real terms, during 2023 and 2024.

The government’s forecasting body expects a 1.6% y/y real advance of the average net wage in 2025 to return just above 3% per year in the coming years. If the government sticks with plans to keep the wages in the public sector steady through 2025 (and cut some bonuses), this looks like a realistic forecast given companies’ more cautious income policies ahead of economic uncertainty.

In January, the average net wage was nominally 1.1% lower compared to November (before the year-end bonuses in December), with the salaries in public administration 0.5% lower. The average net wage in education decreased by 2.0% while that in the health sector increased by 2.6% compared to November, indicating that overall, the public sector payroll has not increased in the first month of the year.

The wages in the computer programming sector dropped by 7.9% compared to November and rose by only 2.2% y/y (marking a real 3% y/y decline) after the employees in the sector were waived by the preferential income tax regime.

In manufacturing, the average net wage dropped by 3.4% compared to November but marked an 11.4% (+6.4% y/y in real terms) advance to RON 4,786 in January.

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