District teachers and doctors risk being left without a salary increase

Budget money in 2024 is unlikely to be enough to cover salaries of all social categories

From January 1 of the coming year, some categories of specialists in the public sector in Russia are expected to increase their salaries by almost 10%. Payments will be indexed to workers in education, social security, healthcare, culture and science. According to Sergei Smirnov, leading researcher at INION RAS, plans to strengthen the well-being of the most vulnerable segments of the population will continue to work, but there may not be enough money for everyone.

– The social decrees of Vladimir Putin, signed by the head of state at the beginning of May 2012 and which set targets for salaries of public sector employees, the investment attractiveness of our country for business and in other areas, have long lost their relevance. In turn, the task of officials achieving part of the indicators they assumed was never completed. To get closer to such marks, primarily related to the increase in salaries of public sector workers, regional authorities often resorted to renaming positions and “fragmenting” rates.

We can conclude that a new financial reality has arrived in Russia. Our country’s economy has undergone major changes over the past decade, driven by inflationary pressures that have cast doubt on previously set government goals to strengthen the well-being of Russians on fixed incomes.

– In fact, the income of state employees should grow by a larger percentage?

– According to unofficial information, the salaries of medical workers alone have lost about 26% in purchasing weight over the past ten years. Many doctors express a desire to leave the public hospitals and clinics where they have worked for many years. Such negative sentiments are determined not only by the salary fund. Many doctors and nurses do not like the overwork imposed on them – the additional voluntary-compulsory load due to the lack of staff. Annual one-time indexations were adequate to the economic development of Russia in 2012, when the May decrees appeared, but now the level of salary increases for workers in budget categories with fixed rates can no longer be satisfied with the subsidized amounts of state financial support promised in the amount of 9.8%, which is unlikely to allow to scare away many public sector employees from looking for and moving to a better-paid, although perhaps non-core, place of work.

– Inflation in Russia by the end of 2023 promises not to exceed 7.5-8%. Will the expected indexation of almost 10% cover wage losses?

– Only at first glance. For example, in industry, salaries increase by a larger amount. According to various sources, this fall the demand of employers for engineers of various categories in our country has increased by 44% compared to that period last year, and their average offered salaries have increased by 19%. The rate of increase in pay for teachers and doctors has clearly not kept pace with the increase in salaries of their educated colleagues in the manufacturing sector. Therefore, there is an incentive to change your specialty and try yourself in a new, more promising job field.

– At the end of July, the Ministry of Labor announced the amount of expenses necessary to increase the minimum wage in 2024. According to the department, the main burden of increasing the minimum wage will fall on regional and municipal budgets: additional expenses of these branches of government will exceed 126 billion rubles. Another approximately 20 billion will come from the federal treasury. Is this fair, since indexation is determined by the center, and local authorities have to pay?

– Hard to tell. Payments to employees involved in federal projects will be indexed. Regional administrations, which are already heavily indebted, will have to either apply for further loans from commercial partners or demand funds from the capital’s financial apparatus. In other words, money will, of course, be allocated for the development of the Tretyakov Gallery or the Pushkin Museum, but federal trenches may not be enough to pay for the salaries of some secondary school in the outback.