An official in group A1 at level 27 of the Bilbao city council earns an average of 27,624 euros more per year, without counting seniority, than another official in the same group and level who performs similar tasks for the General Administration of the State. This huge salary difference It is the most extreme case, but real, according to an exhaustive remuneration study prepared by the CSIF union and presented this Monday, which shows how the more than half a million public employees of the General State Administration (AGE) earn an average of 8,000 euros less per year than workers in autonomous communities and city councils for the same work
Specifically, these 8,000 euros less per year on average in the AGE are the result of the remuneration inequalities suffered by, on the one hand, career officials (8,690 euros less annually on average than their regional and local colleagues), but also among the work staff (7,380 euros less). In turn, these average amounts are obtained from salary difference ranges based on groups and categories that show that state civil servants earn between 11,826 and 4,349 euros less than in communities and town councils. While in the case of workforce, this difference in favor of employees of the regions and local entities ranges between 10,087 and 3,523 euros. In short, these amounts are equivalent, according to the president of the CSIF, Miguel Borra, to the fact that AGE workers “are ceasing to earn 20 euros on average per day compared to their colleagues in the rest of the administrations.”
To reach these conclusions, CSIF technicians assure that they have prepared a report that has involved great complexity in which the multiple salary concepts, groups and typologies of public employees from all administrations have been taken into account. The sources consulted to prepare the report have been official data from the Secretariat of State and Budgets and Expenditures (Ministry of Finance), the Transparency portals of the different CCAA Governments and the official bulletins of the town councils.
Specifically, the salary of each group or subgroup of professional classification, extraordinary payments, the destination complement (which reflects the responsibilities of the position) and the professional complement (which rewards the technical or complexity specificities of each position) have been analyzed. . The study, as explained by its authors this Monday, indicates that there are practically no differences in salaries, payments and destination complement, but there are in the specific complement, which is where they have found a gross variation of up to more than 27,000 euros per year in some of the cases, such as the aforementioned of a group of workers at the Bilbao City Council.
They ask for 1,500 million to equalize salaries
The greatest pay difference is between state and regional employees in the Basque Country, where a person working for the General Administration of the State earns on average 15,805 euros less per year for the same work as a Basque Government worker. Other important differences are also registered with the employees of the Madrid City Council, where its employees earn on average 14,042 euros more per year than someone in the service of the State. Proof of the importance of these salary differences is that, in this last case, for example, to avoid the flight of talent, the Community of Madrid has, since January 1, equated the specific complements with the city council of the capital.
In any case, salary differences between different public administrations are a recognized fact but little addressed in the negotiations between governments and union representatives. Currently, and pending the Executive calling the unions to negotiate the salary increase for public employees, Borra has presented this report that has served as the basis to support a historical demand of this union: salary equalization between administrations. What’s more, after this diagnosis, the union demands from the Government a budget increase of 1,487 million euros, to be paid in three years (2025, 2026 and 2027), which is what they have calculated it would cost to eliminate wage inequalities, to achieve pay equality. full in 2028.
Although, in this union they specify that their demand “does not necessarily imply identical salaries in all administrations, since factors such as the cost of living and other local conditions can influence salary scales.” They do intend to “eliminate unjustified disparities,” they add.
This report comes days after CC OO and UGT will announce they will denounce on November 4 the IV Single Agreement for the Labor Personnel of the General State Administration (AGE) on which 40,000 depend public workers. Precisely, the main demand in the negotiation of the new agreement will be to end the discrimination in salary that AGE employees suffer compared to their counterparts in the autonomous communities or local entities, who, according to these two unions, receive between 8% and 10% more salary for carrying out the same tasks. However, CSIF considers the complaint by CC OO and UGT “hasty” and hopes “that it does not harm the negotiation and the development of improvements in working conditions.”
Next mobilizations
In this scenario, Borra has announced that, after the new Minister of Public Service, Óscar López, has given them silence in response to their salary demands – they have only had one meeting shortly after arriving at the Ministry and he has not responded further. to the call of this plant, according to those in charge— They will call on public employees to mobilize on November 11 and December 16 before the Government subdelegations throughout Spain. In Madrid, these concentrations will be held at the Ministry of Finance, which is responsible for paying the salaries of these workers.
Furthermore, apart from the aforementioned salary equalization between the administrations, the main demand of the CSIF regarding salaries is the negotiation of a “legislative pact” in which it is specified at a minimum that the salaries of civil servants cannot rise below the CPI to guarantee your purchasing power. They then demand that he also negotiate the recovery of the purchasing power lost in recent years — only between 2022 and 2024 that power has fallen by 5% due to “the terrible agreement” signed by CC OO and UGT with the Government, Borra has complained. —.
What’s more, the president of the CSIF has gone further and has specified that the mere opening of negotiations will not stop the mobilizations planned by this union. “If (next year) the Government does not put solutions to our demands on the table, we will think about more drastic solutions,” said Borra, who then specified that said tougher actions would consist of partial stoppages or even a one-day strike in all public administrations. “Although this would be the last resort,” he stated.
