Average Monthly Wages in the Regions Continue Growing

Wages in practically all regions have reached the pre-devaluation standard. However, the declared increase in wages does not lead to an increase in quality of life, rather increases social stratification in society.

Wage growth in the regions is explained by the following two factors.

1) Local Executive Committees Chairmen are required to file monthly reports to the higher instances about the wage increase, which should be at least 5%. Partially, this alone can explain why wages grow. As a consequence of the administrative wage growth regulation, at the end of 2012, enterprises in some regions ended in debt for paying salaries.

2) The statistical growth of average wages in the regions was provided by a number of industrial enterprises’ performance, for instance, by Grodno Azot or Belorussian Steel Works, Naftan and others. At the same time, agricultural regions situated further away from the regional centers were not able to ensure the declared wage growth. This social policy results in greater stratification in society, which will only increase.

Most workers’ wages vary between BYR 2 – 3.5 million. The most common wage offers at the labour market also range between BYR 2 – 3.5 million and are closer to higher margin in regional centers and to lower margin in small towns.

The average monthly salary in the regions and Minsk, National Statistics Committee

For comparison, the average wage in Russia’s Smolensk Region is RUR 26,000 or USD 866.

December 2012 data showed, that the smallest average salary was in the education – BYR 3 206.2 thousand, including both, school teachers and higher education teaching staff. The highest salaries are in construction – BYR 5 567.3 thousand. In the economy in general the highest wages are in the IT sphere – BYR 9,963,646.

To bridge the gap between the salaries in Minsk and other regions, the authorities plan to raise the average salary in 2013 by about USD 100. The above table shows, that these measures will hardly solve the problem, hence, labor migration from the regions will continue.