“Operation yellow coins”: the CGT crushes the increase in the minimum wage proposed by the government and calls for a new mobilization on November 17

She describes the government's announcement as "operation yellow coins". The general secretary of the CGT, Sophie Binet, once again criticized the increase in the minimum wage proposed by the government this Monday, to the tune of 0.6% which is added to the automatic revaluation on prices of 1%. In total, the minimum wage will increase to 1.

502 euros net per month, or 24 euros net more for beneficiaries, far from the 150 euros net requested by the CGT. “Without the revaluation on inflation, the boost is limited to 5 to 8 euros in reality,” said the general secretary. “It’s fed up.

"If the minimum wage has increased by 5% since the start of the year, Sophie Binet believes that it is "not up to the cost of living and needs", recalling in passing that France had not increased the minimum wage for 14 years and that "France is the European country which has increased its minimum wage the least for 10 years, we are now a country of low wages". According to Eurostat data, the minimum wage has actually increased less in France than in the countries neighbors In 2016, the French minimum wage was one of the highest in the euro zone (1.

467 euros) and was only exceeded by Luxembourg (1,923 euros) and Belgium (1,502 euros).

Germany had only just created one. Job destruction Sophie Binet also returned to the risk of job destruction in the event of an increase of 150 euros net per month demanded by the CGT. “At these levels, we affect employment.

If you increase wages, this could eliminate 230,000 jobs,” warned Jean-Pierre Farandou. “The figures given by the government are highly contested, even by economists close to the executive,” replied the general secretary, once again giving as an example our European neighbors such as Spain, which has increased its minimum wage in recent years, without impact on its growth.

Sophie Binet was annoyed by the government's double talk on jobs, returning to the government's decision on Monday to increase the tax exemption ceiling for overtime, which will lead to "increasing overtime rather than recruiting". New mobilization on November 17 Faced with these government responses deemed unsatisfactory, the CGT called for maintaining pressure through mobilization on November 17 for an immediate increase in wages. “We must mobilize at the polls and in the streets,” insisted Sophie Binet.

This call has, for the moment, not been followed by the other union forces (CFDT, FO) who prefer to wait for the start of negotiations around the revaluations of the minimums for each professional branch. A decree was also published this Tuesday in the Official Journal so that reductions in employer contributions for companies in professional sectors whose conventional minimums are lower than the SMIC be reduced by calculating them from these minimums and no longer from the amount of the SMIC. A demand pushed by the unions, so that companies are financially sanctioned if their branch minimum is below the minimum wage.

Machine-translated from French