Paraguayan Minister of Labor opens the door to a minimum wage readjustment

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Paraguayan Minister of Labor, Carla Bacigalupo, revealed that talks have already begun between the Central Bank of Paraguay (BCP), the business sector, and unions to study a possible readjustment of the minimum wage.

Paraguay revises that figure every year, but in 2020, because of the pandemic and the economic situation, the country’s president, Mario Abdo Benítez, decreed to keep it at 2,192,839 guaraníes (about 327.56 dollars).

Bacigalupo recalled that the readjustment of the minimum wage is linked to the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a statistic dependent on the BCP.

The minister added that all the actors involved would “continue dialoguing and building” given the possibility of “carrying out the readjustment in accordance with what is established by law”.

Bacigalupo participated this Wednesday in an event at the Government Palace. She insisted on the education and training of workers as a way out of the rise in unemployment.

According to figures from the National Statistics Institute (INE), data for the first quarter of 2021 registered 306,000 unemployed people, according to figures from the National Statistics Institute (INE), 40,000 more than in the same period of 2020, the minister recalled.

“Restrictive measures that protect health have this undesired effect on employment,” the minister explained to justify those numbers.

Bacigalupo maintained that the Ministry of Labor is designing policies so that “the crisis has the least possible impact” and avoided talking about a “projected peak” of unemployment.