Workers renew calls for P100 wage hike

MANILA, Philippines — Amid a continuing rise in the country’s inflation rate, militant workers yesterday renewed calls for the immediate granting of a P100 across-the-board salary increase.

Partido Manggagawa (PM) said that the workers are demanding P100 salary adjustments to help recover their eroded purchasing power as a result of the continuing increase in prices of essential goods.

PM chair Rene Magtubo said, “P100 is wage recovery, not a real increase in salaries. From 2018 to the present, real wages have declined by a significant amount of eight percent. The rising inflation rate further erodes real wages.”

Magtubo noted that data from the National Wages and Productivity Commission showed that the P537 minimum wage in Metro Manila is worth only P494 due to inflation since 2018.

Minimum wage earners, he said, have not received any pay hike for the past three years.

According to Magtubo, workers are calling on Congress to hold an emergency session to tackle a legislated wage hike.

“The regional wage boards are useless. Instead, workers want Congress to pass a law mandating a P100 across-the-board wage increase, even for those receiving salaries above the minimum wage since everyone has been affected by inflation,” he explained.

Magtubo said the P100 increase is really not enough to raise minimum wages to the level of the cost of living, thus a holistic approach necessitates a cash aid, price discounts and a jobs program in response to the spike in food prices.

PM proposed that families of the unemployed and informal workers should be given cash assistance of P10,000 a month.

“In the long term, support for farmers must be accelerated, food sovereignty must be promoted and land conversion must be stopped. Local programs that connect farmers to consumers and workers’ communities must be encouraged,” Magtubo said.