In the press conference following yesterday’s cabinet meeting, the dispute was public and notorious. The Vice President of the Government and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz, was busy explaining that the government, in agreement with the unions and disregarding the employers, has decided to raise the minimum wage (SMI) by another €50 per month – to 14 payments of €1,184 per month – a decision that affects 2.4 million workers.
What was surprising was that Yolanda Díaz publicly stated that she had learned from the press that the minimum wage would now be subject to taxation, which means that the Treasury will take about 300 of the additional €700 per year that employers will have to pay. A comment to which the spokesperson minister, Pilar Alegría, from PSOE, replied: ‘That is not true.
Yolanda Díaz and the coalition of parties she leads, Sumar, are determined that the minimum wage (SMI) be exempt from taxation, and yesterday afternoon they presented a proposal in Congress that could receive support from the main party in the chamber, the PP.
The Treasury, for its part, is insisting that the €16,576 per year represented by the new minimum wage be taxed because, otherwise, pensioners who fall within that income threshold would also have to stop paying taxes, which could result in a loss of nearly one billion euros in revenue when all is considered.
