Serbia to lift minimum wage to 551 euro as of Jan 1

Serbia’s government will increase the minimum monthly net wage by 10.1% to 64,554 dinars ($647/ 551 euro) as of January 1, finance minister Sinisa Mali said on Tuesday, after failing to reach an agreement on the hike with both employers and unions.
The January increase will come on top of a 9.4% extraordinary hike in minimum monthly wage, effective October 1. The government will formalise the decision on the increase on Thursday, Mali said in a press release, following a meeting of the Social and Economic Council, which brings together representatives of the government, employers and trade unions.

During the negotiations that started last month, both employers and unions were unhappy with the government’s proposal for the minimum monthly wage to be lifted to 551 euro as of January 1, as reported earlier by local media. Employers proposed that the minimum wage stay unchanged at 500 euro, saying they were overburdened with expenses, while unions sought an increase to 70,000 dinars, citing rising electricity and food prices, as well as overall inflation acceleration. Both groups stuck to their positions during the Tuesday meeting, the Beta news agency reported, citing representatives of employers and unions.

Mali noted on Tuesday that the government will partly meet the demands of the employers by increasing the non-taxable portion of minimum wages by 20.4% to 34,221 dinars, adding that about 90,000 people work for minimum wage in Serbia.

In Serbia, monthly minimum wages are typically increased each January. The government resorted to the October hike, pressed by the rising dissatisfaction over rising food prices as well as months-old anti-government protests triggered by the collapse of the canopy at the train station in the northern city of Novi Sad on November 1, which killed 16 people. To address this discontent, president Aleksandar Vucic last month also unveiled a set of measures aimed at boosting citizens’ purchasing power and standards of living, including capping retailers’ profit margins and offering lower interest rates on consumer loans.

In May, the minimum consumer basket in Serbia cost 55,870 dinars, according to the most recent data available from the trade ministry. In July, the country’s annual consumer price inflation accelerated to 4.9% from 4.6% the month before.

In the second quarter of 2025, there were about 2.37 million employed persons in Serbia out of a population of around 6.59 million, the statistical office has said.

In January, the minimum monthly net wage in Serbia was increased by 13.7%.

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