LMP calls for inflation-linked pay rise in public sector

Mate Kanasz-Nagy said that inflation now exceeds 20 percent and wage workers, typically public sector employees, were the worst hit by soaring food prices.

LMP proposes that for those working in the social sector, education, health care and state administration, there should be a wage correction on January 1 and July 1 of each year, equal to the rate of inflation.

This could be financed by raising the corporate tax, Kanasz-Nagy said, adding that a new, 25 percent corporate tax rate should be introduced above sales revenue of 500 million forints (EUR 1.3m).

Kanasz-Nagy also called for the introduction of a minimum wage for college or university graduates, which LMP has already advocated earlier. This would exceed the minimum wage for skilled workers by 30 percent, he added.

For teachers and other professionals in the education sector, whose situation, he said, had been deteriorating since 2016, LMP urges a one-off pay rise of 45 percent to compensate for the inflation of the previous years, which then should be followed by an inflation-linked wage rise in their case as well, Kanasz-Nagy said.