National Commission Fails to Agree on New Minimum Wage

[Keith Woolford 633]

The Government must now establish new minimum wage rate

• Oscar Sulbarán Fri, 12/15/2017 - 20:50

After four months of having formed the National Minimum Wage Commission (CNSM) the Minister of Labor, Luis Ernesto Carles, reported that there was no agreement and it will be up to the Executive to establish the new minimum wage. Through his Twitter account @LE_CarlesR the Head of the Labor Ministry thanked the contribution of employers and employees who since August 16 were part of the CNSM.

The National Council of the Private Enterprise (Conep) attributed the lack of consensus to the methodology used at the negotiating table. Conep described the formula proposed by the Ministry of Labor and Labor Development as improvised, being different from the one used in 2015 when the last minimum wage adjustment was made. In a statement, the entity that groups various private sectors asked: “the National Government to fulfill the role it has to play now and review the minimum wage, objectively and scientifically, without pre-electoral influences and thinking first of the competitiveness and sustainability of the jobs of thousands of Panamanians”.