The salaries of some half a million white-collar workers may rise by 1.43% in January next year, however, the final figure will not be known until the end of this year when the last inflation figure of this year is confirmed.
In a report published on Wednesday, Belgium's statistics office Statbel noted that Belgium's "smoothed health index" rose to 125.73 points in November. The index is used to calculate wage indexations and is largely based on the consumer price index but excludes alcoholic beverages, tobacco products, and certain kinds of fuel. The amount is slightly above the threshold required to trigger automatic salary and benefit hikes.
At the end of October, HR company SD Worx provisionally predicted a slightly higher indexation in January for these white-collar workers at 1.49%, but following the data from Statbel, it depreciated this figure slightly to 1.43%.
The figure applies to white-collar workers from Joint Committee 200, the country's largest joint committee, which sets wage and working conditions for people in industry, sales, services and agriculture.
Not the final figure
Geert Vermeir of SD Worx stressed that the figure is an estimate and that the indexation figure could still deviate once the December inflation figure is available. "But inflation would already have to be going very crazy" to still involve major changes, he noted. Changes in the final figure, he expects rather "in the second decimal place".
The final indexation for the half-million or so white-collar employees from this joint committee will likely be made on 22 December, when Statbel is expected to publish the inflation figure for December. The smoothed health index is the average health index value over the previous four months.
In any case, the percentage will be much lower than in January this year, when more than 500,000 who fall under the CP200 saw their salaries rise by 11.08%.
For some other sectors indexing in January, a final figure is already available, as the November figure suffices for the calculation. In hospitality (PC 302) and food industry (blue-collar workers PC 118 and white-collar workers PC 220) as well as for goods transport workers (PC 140.03), such as truck drivers, there is an index of 1.83%. Here, the November figure suffices for calculation.
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In December, civil service salaries will rise due to the overrun of the pivot index last month. "Many salaries in the private non-profit sector follow the same pivot, so there too there is a 2% indexation in November or December."
SD Worx expects another overshoot of the pivot index in June 2024, thus impacting benefits and salaries of civil servants and compensation in the non-profit sector in the months after.
