May the 9th, 2023 - Croatian wages are set to increase for a significant proportion of the population thanks to recently introduced government measures, but it won't be the case for everyone.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, neither the complete abolition of surtaxes, nor the increase of the non-taxable part of Croatian wages, nor the reduction of income tax rates will raise the salaries of about two-thirds of taxpayers from next year on, because even with the current rules, those individuals don't pay those particular taxes, as Novi list reports.

Only those people with a net salary of at least 800 euros per month or even those who earn more than the average net salary stand to actually benefit financially from this latest government move aimed at increasing Croatian wages. This is the main reason why the government is seriously considering reducing pension contributions in the first place in order to raise the figure those who earn lower salaries take home each month.

That said, after the abolition of surtaxes, Croatian wages would not increase even for those with above-average incomes, because many of them live in cities and municipalities that have not introduced or abolished the surtaxes and so they'll keep on having to pay local levies.

Where surtaxes aren't already being paid, its cancellation from January the 1st will not actually bring anyone a higher salary, and it's highly unlikely that those cities and municipalities will take advantage of the opportunity to further reduce income tax rates, because they already tried to relieve the burden on their residents by deciding to waive the need to pay surtaxes previously.

Just many workers will actually be left without a salary increase from January the 1st due to these circumstances, although the government keeps on claiming that salaries will increase for everyone, is currently unknown. All we do know is that facts will need to be faced at some point or another, as the Croatian Government is expected to come out with this data when it presents its proposal for tax changes.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated news section.

January the 26th, 2023 - Alright, this title is slightly misleading because we've needed Croatian pension and wage growth for a very long time now, but after becoming a full Eurozone member state, it's high time that we saw the numbers in our bank accounts go up, even just a little bit.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, recently, there have been signs of inflation finally stabilising after a certain drop in electricity and gas prices was duly noted, but despite that, in general prices are still high, and Croatian living standards are falling, which is why Croatian pension and wage increases are now more necessary than ever.

These are just some of the conclusions reached as part of the recently held "Eurostands - Perspectives and challenges" in the City of Zagreb. The head of the Independent Croatian Trade Unions, Kresimir Sever, reiterated that subjective inflation is still being very much felt by most of the country's households and is significantly higher than official statistics. He said because of that, Croatian pension and wage growth is necessary. On the other hand, the chief economist of the Croatian Association of Employers (HUP), Hrvoje Stojic, said that HUP members have seen their employee salaries rase above the national inflation level.

Stojic also noted that the wider Eurozone's economy will experience a certain strong slowdown throughout 2023, during which there will be a "cooling" of aggregate demand, but he added that inflation could be up to two percentage points lower compared to the estimates provided back at the end of 2022.

He believes that due to the unusually mild winter we've all been experiencing, the whole of Europe could avoid dipping into the expected recession in 2023, but also that there is an option to simply "postpone" it to the second half of this year, or even until next year. Professor Marijana Ivanov of the Faculty of Economics warned that inflation reduces the real value of everything we own, and that we need to keep paying attention to the trends.

However, it is positive that there are still no risks of unemployment growth in the Croatian economy, but the general standard of living in slipping.

''Croatian living standards are decreasing, but somehow we're managing despite all of the current challenges," she concluded.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated news section.

May the 9th, 2022 - With Eurozone entry rapidly approaching and due at the very beginning of next year, just what will the average Croatian wage and pension be? It seems an increase is on the cards.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, when Croatia introduces the euro at the beginning of 2023, the average Croatian wage (net salary) will stand at around 900 euros, and an average pension will stand at around 320 euros, considering the fact that due to ongoing inflation, personal incomes and pensions across Croatia could increase slightly before the changeover from the kuna to the euro anyway.

If we take in some information and consider it relevant data on the average net salary across the EU back in 2021, which amounted to 1916 euros per month, it means that the average Croatian salary needs to be about a thousand euros to reach the EU average. In nearby Austria, the average net salary last year was 2053 euros, and in Belgium - an impressive 2091 euros.

In Bulgaria, the average net income last year was 413 euros, and the average Croatian wage was 797 euros, while the neighbouring Slovenians received an average of 1,038 euros per month back in 2021, writes Slobodna Dalmacija.

The Czechs were doing slightly better than the Croats were with a typical net salary of 813 euros, and the Danes were much better, with 3,100 euros, placing them at the very top of the European Union (EU). They are closely followed by the Swedes with a salary of 3062 euros.

The Estonians are also better paid than Croats typically are, with an average salary of 958 euros net, with the Latvians and Lithuanians being weaker with 648 euros and 645 euros respectively. The people of Cyprus receive an excellent 1,658 euros, and Malta also earns well from the Croatian perspective, with an average Maltese wage being about 2261 euros per month.

They are followed by rich EU countries: Finland with 2509 euros, France with 2157 euros and Germany with 2270 euros as an average salary.

The average Greek earns 917 euros, a Portuguese worker 846, a Pole 736, a Slovak 690, and a Hungarian 683 euros. Over in Romania, the average net salary is only 522 euros, meaning that only the Bulgarians are the poorest in the EU.

The average net salary in Italy is 1,762 euros, and in neighbouring Spain 1,718 euros. The real "heavyweights" are the Icelanders with 3435 euros and the Luxembourgers with 3009 euros, followed by the Irish with 2479 euros and the Dutch with 2263 euros.

For more, make sure to check out our lifestyle section.

May the 5th, 2022 - MP Katarina Peovic believes that in order to comfortable cover all costs of living, from rent to loan repayments to food, utility bills and everything else that might come up from month to month, the minimum Croatian wage should be 10,000 kuna per month.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, Workers' Front MP Katarina Peovic was a guest in the Newsroom on N1 television recently, where she commented on the changes made to the Labour Law.

"It started all being talked about because at the beginning of the pandemic, the Government wanted to suspend a good part of the Labour Law. Various unions from across Europe reacted to that, so Plenkovic instead decided to do it step by step and Minister Aladrovic was given the task of coming up with a new Labour Law which would include suspensions under the justification of regulating work from home,'' said MP Katarina Peovic, adding:

"This has been being done in secret and in non-transparent conditions for a year and a half now. What comes out of it isn't good - to have more flexibility in terms of working hours, the workplace, but to the detriment of the employees themselves. It's criminal that we received the draft law without the Government ever having made it public. I'll state without hesitation what we've seen. If an employee is unable to meet something introduced in the draft (such as having to deal with unpredictable working hours), then they will be allowed to switch to part-time work, especially if they're in a situation like needing to care for a child, an elderly person or someone who isn't well,'' Peovic said.

"We suggest shortening the working week down from 40 to 35 working hours"

Asked what the most important emphases we can take from this are, and what the changes that will bring better conditions for workers about are, MP Katarina Peovic said: "First, the most important thing is to arrange the institute of temporary work. We were the first in all of Europe in terms of having rather precarious and non-standard employment contracts, now we're in second place. This is a plague in this country, about 21% of people are working on fixed-term contracts. We've proposed that the three-year limit be reduced to one year. Secondly, we propose shortening the working week from 40 down to 35 working hours. Croats work more than the European average, around 10 hours more than the Dutch do per week.

"The definition of a basic salary is important. Workers working for minimum wage work overtime and even on Sundays in order to reach the minimum wage, which is completely unacceptable," she added.

"Our average salary is at the level of the Slovenian minimum"

She pointed out that she often agrees with the ruling party when it comes to detecting the problem, but not when it comes to proposing a proper and working solution: "If there is one topic that should connect the left-leaning parties, then it's the topic of work. We've been following Croatia's race to the absolute bottom for decades. We have over 800,000 able-bodied people who are unemployed. We're a country that has no solution for almost a million able-bodied people. Such a country cannot prosper. We cannot reduce ourselves to tourism alone. Our average salary is at the Slovenian minimum level, and our cost of living is no higher than that of Slovenia.''

MP Katarina Peovic also revealed what the Croatian minimum wage according to the research should be:

"The new union conducted an in-depth research and stated that the minimum wage that could cover all living expenses should be over 10 thousand kuna."

For more, make sure to check out our politics section.

April the 1st, 2022 - Croatian wages paid per hour rather unsurprisingly fall short of the European Union (EU) average, even with state benefits included in the final sum.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the price of an hour of work, which includes state benefits, stood at a mere 11.2 euros back in 2021, according to a report which looked into the matter by Lider.

The survey, conducted at the level of the European Union, showed just how below Croatian wages paid by hour are when compared to the general European Union average, given that the average cost of labour in the EU stood at 29.1 euros, and 32.8 euros in the Eurozone.

It isn't remotely encouraging that the Republic of Croatia has found itself in an extremely unimpressive fifth place on the list. As in fifth from the end, not from the beginning. In the EU, Latvia has lower labour costs than Croatia does, with costs of 11.1 euros, in neighbouring Hungary, the same costs stand at 10.4 euros, in Romania, the somewhat infamous 8.5 euros remains so, and last on the list comes Bulgaria, where the cost of an hour of work it costs a mere seven euros.

At the same time, Western countries, with which Croatia often likes to (rather unrealistically) compare itself to, are somewhat different.

The highest labour costs can be found in Denmark, where an hour of work costs a far, far higher 46.9 euros. Right behind it are Luxembourg, with 43 euros, Belgium, with 41.6 euros, and then France, the Netherlands and Sweden, with just under 40 euros per hour.

Austria, Germany and Ireland, countries where Croats often head to with hopes of a more stable economic situation and better prospects, are among the best in the European Union when we look at how much employers have to spend in order to have workers.

In Austria, the price of an hour of work stands at 37.5 euros, in Germany it is negligibly lower - 37.2 euros - and Ireland follows them closely with 33.5 euros per hour of labour.

For more on Croatian wages, the domestic economy and working in Croatia, make sure to check out our lifestyle section.

May 31st, 2021 - The digital market in Croatia is not fully mature, and Croatia belongs to a set of countries that could be termed "lagging fast movers," the World Bank says in a final report on the subject, as the fast internet is too expensive for Croatian Wages. 

In analyzing the ICT sector, the World Bank focused on the internet (fixed and mobile), telephony (fixed and mobile), and pay TV markets.

The World Bank explains Croatia's insufficient maturity because most revenues still come from telephony, not internet services.

In terms of the Digital Economy and Society Index, Croatia is below the EU average in terms of digital performance and service usage, but their rate of improvement is above it. 

As for fixed internet, Croatia has the opportunity to additionally accelerate its performance because the fixed broadband coverage is better than in comparable countries, but that is not reflected in usage.

Croatia is markedly below average in actual access despite coverage in terms of fast service (at least 30 Mbps download). As for ultrafast fixed internet (100 Mbps), Croatia is below average in terms of coverage and service usage.

Although Croatia has made progress in recent years regarding the take-up of fast fixed broadband service, "urban take-up is still more than twice that of rural take-up."

The report also says that "Croatia performs particularly badly with respect to rural penetration in comparison to other EU countries and remains far from the 100 percent EU household take-up target for 2020."

Affordability is one reason for Croatia’s underperformance regarding fixed broadband take-up and overall digital market assessment. The World Bank says that in terms of affordability, Croatia is quite below most EU countries.

For more news about Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page. 

ZAGREB, 20 May 2021 - Croatia's take-home pay in March came to HRK 7,138, rising 6.3% on the year in the nominal terms and five percent in the real terms, according to the data released by the national statistical office on Thursday (DZS).

The average wage in March rose by 1.4% in the nominal terms and o.3% in the real terms in comparison to February 2021.

The DZS says on its website that "the highest average monthly paid off net earnings per person in paid employment in legal entities for March 2021 were paid off in Information service activities and amounted to 13 237 kuna, while the lowest earnings were paid off in the activity Manufacture of wearing apparel and amounted to 4 387 kuna."

Median net earnings for March 2021 amounted to 6,000 kuna, while median gross earnings amounted to 7 728 kuna. It means that half of the people employed were paid less and the other half more than this net amount.

(€1 = HRK 7.5)

For more about business in Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page.

April the 29th, 2021 - Croatian wages are often the topic of conversation, and while things have definitely improved on the pay packet front over recent years, who has experienced the highest increases over the last five years, and who has experienced the least?

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the average net Croatian wage of employees who hold a university degree exceeded 9,000 kuna back in pre-pandemic 2019 and increased by 11 percent over the last five years, while the salaries of unskilled workers grew by 20 percent, Vecernji list reports.

Among employees in legal entities, companies and public institutions, Croatia has about 265 thousand highly educated workers who make up the second largest group of employees by education.

The most numerous are workers with a high school level education, of which there are about 595 thousand. Their average monthly wage stood at 5,460 kuna and reached 60 percent of the average salary of university graduates. According to that, schooling truly does pay off, meaning that university-educated person in Croatia earns about 109 thousand kuna per year on average, and those with a high school diploma earn much less - about 65 thousand kuna.

Three groups of employees earn more than the national average, those with a university degree, those with higher education qualifications and other highly qualified workers. A high school diploma brings about two thousand kuna less in terms of Croatian wages than a university degree does. This is equal to 7154 kuna. In Croatia there are about 98 thousand employees who have a high school diploma only. In third place are a small number of highly skilled workers - about 10,500 of them - who earned an average of 6,562 kuna before the coronavirus pandemic struck.

It has always been claimed that Croatia is chronically short of skilled workers, but this couldn't actually be concluded from looking more deeply into the movement of Croatian wages because in five years, the average wages of these groups of employees rose by only ten percent and grew the slowest in groups who do have a higher/university education.

In the last five years, the Croatian wages of about 56 thousand unskilled workers were the ones to have actually grown the fastest - by a surprising 20 percent - exceeding four thousand kuna, reports Vecernji list.

For more on Croatian wages, paying taxes, working in Croatia and much more, make sure to follow our lifestyle section.