Return of pledge to raise minimum wage
As 2018 draws nearer, the government has repeated one of its main election promises that brought leftist SYRIZA to power in 2015, as Labor Minister Effie Achtsioglou left open the possibility of an increase in the minimum wage as soon as Greece emerges from its bailout program in August.
Speaking to Sto Kokkino radio station on Wednesday, Achtsioglou said her ministry’s main objective in the new year will be to combat youth unemployment, “while the second objective can be none other than the debate on the minimum wage.”
She added that “we need to review the level of the minimum wage, and possibly after the exit from the fiscal adjustment program this might be the first move we will make.”
Greece’s creditors have made it clear that a main component of the post-program framework to be discussed after the completion of the third bailout review is that the reforms implemented will not be reversed.
