The minimum wage increases from September 1 to 3,300 lei for all employees and to 4,500 lei in construction, sources

The minimum wage for the economy will increase from September 1 to 3,300 gross lei, and from January 1, 2024 to 3,750 lei, government sources announced on Thursday. From September 1, the minimum wage in construction will also increase, to the amount of 4,500 lei. The coalition is also analyzing a package of fiscal measures, including the elimination of some fiscal facilities, proposed by Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, in the context in which the losses resulting from the granting of fiscal facilities would amount to 75 billion lei.

The quoted sources claim that it was agreed with the officials from the European Commission that from September there will be only two VAT rates, 9% and 19% respectively. At the moment there are many exemptions from the 19% rate, such as the 5% for culture, books, school textbooks, some tourist services, real estate transactions, animal food.

The European Commission demands that these exemptions no longer exist, and this would mean that 5% VAT would no longer exist except for medical prostheses. VAT would remain reduced, at 9%, for food, medicine and HORECA services.

The fiscal changes would also concern the taxes paid by large companies, but the discussions in the Coalition are difficult, because the PSD and the liberal Minister of Finance, Marcel Boloș, support the making of these decisions, while the PNL opposes it, even criticizing its own minister A new round of negotiations on this topic will take place between the leaders of the Coalition on Monday.

The Government must cover a 20 billion lei hole in the budget. PSD and PNL discussed a series of fiscal measures, but they failed to reach a final conclusion. A meeting of the PSD-PNL Coalition to adopt fiscal measures to cover the hole in the budget will take place next week, according to official sources for HotNews.ro.

In the previous meetings of the PSD and PNL Coalition, a series of fiscal measures were discussed but without a final decision. However, there is a consensus on some proposals, claim the cited sources. The liberals claim that they will not agree to tax increases under any circumstances, with the first vice-president Rareș Bogdan claiming that there are “two visions” regarding the “fat state” and “pressure on the private environment”.