Chile: Boric announces new minimum wage with 14.3%increase: it will be $ 468 in August

Chilean President Gabriel Boric signed into law on Monday the new minimum wage in favor of 850,000 peoplein a country facing inflationary surge.

At the promulgation ceremony at the government palace, Boric pointed out that “our government is fully committed to promoting decent work, guaranteeing that our country’s workers can have a fair income”.

He added that the declared minimum wage “is the largest nominal increase in 29 years.”

Basic revenue, which will take effect after publication in the official gazette, will increase in two phases: from $ 410 in April to $ 445 this month and at $ 468 in Augustaccumulating an increase of 58 dollars.

If the accumulated inflation for the 12 months to December 2022 exceeds 7%, the project also specifies that the minimum income will increase to 410,000 pesos per month. ($ 492) from January next year.

The bill that approved the increase of a temporary subsidy of 26 dollars in May and 30 dollars in August for about 180,000 small businesses to increase the basic income of their workers.

The increase takes place at the time when Chile registers annual inflation of 10.5%, the largest in 28 years. In addition, the rate of consumer loans, which thousands of Chileans attended, reached 26.98% in mid-May, its highest level since 2015, the Central Bank reported on Monday.

According to Boric’s government program, which he took office in March, at the end of his term in 2026 the minimum wage is at 585 dollars.

Inflation, violence in the two southern regions of the country and rising crime in the Chilean capital are the biggest problems facing Boric, that approval remains at 38%according to pollster Plaza Pública Cadem.

better outside

On the same day when the nomination of the prestigious American magazine Time, one of the well-known surveys in Chile, conducted monthly by the company Cadem, ensured that only 38% of those surveyed agreed with the management of president, compared to 50% who reject it and the rest do not speak out.

The same poll, which is not one of the most reliable but one of the most public in local journalism, offers a high percentage of approval, approximately 77%, on Boric’s decision to impose a state of emergency in the turbulent region of Araucanía, despite promising not to do so and criticizing his predecessor for doing so.

And it shows the reality of the young president since he won the ballot in December: reap applause and optimism abroad while trying to ride the wave of criticism raised from the right and neoliberal business sector.

In this context, Time noted in its long -awaited article that “the success of the former student leader represents a change of guard,” but more importantly, marked a change of direction for the Chilean economy and possibly the world, ”wrote Nobel Prize in Economics, Joseph Stiglitz, author of the president’s profile in the prestigious publication.

“On the night Boric won the primaries, he promised: ‘If Chile is the cradle of neoliberalism, it will also be its grave!’ And that has been the cry of people around the world seeking an alternative to the right-wing economic policies of the last five decades, ”the text continues.

“Boric’s approach combines financial responsibility with a more competitive economy, better social protections and working conditions, equality and social inclusion and environmental protection, ”he argued about the project of the 36-year-old president of South America.

laboratory of economics

Consistent with this argument, the Columbia University professor emphasizes that “in a political divide and the effort being made to create a new constitution, Boric will need all the skills he has already demonstrated: listening and talking, empathy and deep understanding of Chilean history and culture.

“It makes Chile once again the world’s social, economic and political laboratory,” Stiglitz concludes.

Last December, with a resounding electoral victory against far -right José Antonio Kast in the presidential runoff, Boric became the youngest president of the country during his tenure, in addition to the most elected head of state in the history of the republic of Chile.

Leader of a coalition between the Broad Front and the Communist Party, Boric promotes a “transformative” government programthat the horizon was to dismantle Chile’s neoliberal economic structure to allow for a social welfare system, similar to that in some European countries.

For some, Boric’s government marked the beginning of a new political era ending the transition after the dictatorshipbecause it was the first administration not part of the two major governing blocs since the return to democracy in 1990 and the leftmost from Salvador Allende (1970-1973).

In this way, Chile is positioned as the nucleus of outstanding political processes on a global scale, featuring in 2021 the inclusion of the first president of the Constitutional Convention –the body governing the drafting of the country’s new main charter-, Elisa Loncón , on the list of the 100 most influential people in the world.

Source: AP, EFE and AFP

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