Parliament passes bill enabling 11 new types of minimum wages depending on education

The Parliament has passed a law initiated by 37 MPs from all parties, which introduces the differentiated minimum wage for employees in Romania , depending on their education. Therefore, an employee with completed higher education and who has also a PhD must be paid by at least RON  4,460 gross wage.

There will be 11 types of minimum wages depending on the education and the position instead of three minimum salaries as at present (minimum wage for people without college degrees, another one for those with higher education and one for those working in constructions).

Depending on the employee’s qualifications, the amount of the monthly gross wage is settled by enforcing a ratio related to the gross minimum salary in the country, which is RON 2,330. The ratio starts from the value of 1 for the unqualified workers and reaches the value of 2 for those who have a PhD.

For instance, a unqualified worker is paid a gross minimum salary of RON 2,230, employees who graduated a vocational school or a faculty – RON 2,676, while an employee with higher education and a master degree will have a gross salary of at least RON 4,014. The minimum gross wage for the employees with PhDs mounts to RON 4,460.

The law goes to Presidency for promulgation, but, on the other hand, it is not endorsed by the representatives of Private Small and Medium Enterprises, who announced they will ask for the law to be challenged to the Constitutional Court.