As is the case every year, the SMIC minimum wage will undergo a mechanical adjustment on January 1. The rise in the minimum wage, linked to inflation, will be 0.9%, i.e. an increase of 14 euros gross per month on January 1, 2022. The government has no plans to increase the minimum wage further.
No boost recommended by the SMIC expert group
"We're not going to give the minimum wage a boost," declared Labor Minister Elisabeth Borne on Cnews. The reason given was a recommendation by the group of experts on the minimum wage, which fears that an increase in the SMIC would be " detrimental to the employment of the most vulnerable ".
According to the SMIC expert group's annual report, published on November 26, a further increase in the SMIC would not be appropriate " to reduce in-work poverty, the primary factor of which is the number of hours worked, well before the level of the hourly wage".
Although the government is not planning to give the SMIC a boost, it will nevertheless increase on January 1, 2022, as it does every year as part of the legal revaluation process. The increase will be 0.9%, or 14 euros gross per month. The hourly SMIC will therefore rise from 10.48 euros to 10.57 euros gross, and the monthly amount, calculated on the basis of a 35-hour week, will be 1603 euros gross, or 1269 euros net.
4.1% year-on-year increase in the minimum wage
The formula for calculating the mechanical increase in the SMIC is based on two elements. The first element is the evolution of inflation measured for households in the first quintile of the standard-of-living distribution.
The first quintile corresponds to the fifth of the population with the lowest standard of living. This change in the consumer price index, excluding tobacco, is studied between November 2021 and the month taken into account for the last revaluation, i.e. last August. According to Insee statistics, the change was 0.9%.
The second element taken into account in calculating the mechanical rise in the SMIC is half the annual increase in the purchasing power of the SHBOE, i.e. the gross hourly wage for blue-collar and white-collar workers, before payment of social benefits and deduction of social security contributions, from the end of September and over a one-year period. This year, this second element has no impact, as the 1.5% rise in the SHBOE was less than the 2.3% annual inflation rate in September.
In one year, the SMIC will have risen by 64 euros gross, a total increase of 4.1%, with successive increases of 15 euros on January 1, 2021, 35 euros on October 1 and 14 euros to come on January 1, 2022.
In a press release, the CGT deplored the government's failure to provide a helping hand, at a time when " prices are rocketing in many areas of household spending ". The government intends to improve the purchasing power of lower-income households through other measures, notably the energy voucher. It is also counting on industry-level negotiations, and plans to convene a meeting of the social partners on December 17.