Leading Turkish business group wants to share minimum wage rise burden with state

ISTANBUL - Anadolu Agency

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Turkey’s leading conservative business association has suggested that the burden expected to be created by the rise in the minimum wage should be shared equally with the state. 

“If election promises had not been made to increase the minimum wage, the expected annual rise would have been around 10 percent in line with the estimated increase in inflation. However, we now see an expected increase in the minimum wage of around 20 percent,” said Independent Industrialists and Businesspeople Association (MÜSİAD) head Nail Olpak, speaking at a Nov. 26 meeting to announce the association’s expectations from the new cabinet. 

“We suggest sharing this expected burden from a minimum wage rise to 1,300 Turkish Liras,” Olpak added.

Ahead of the Nov. 1 general election, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) vowed to raise the minimum wage from 1,000 liras to 1,300 liras, and the newly announced cabinet has said it will recommend the proposal to the Minimum Wage Commission. 

MÜSİAD head Olpak said such a rise would lead to an additional 30 billion-lira burden on Turkish companies, with 24 billion liras of this burden falling on the shoulders of small and medium-sized enterprises. 

He said MÜSİAD had compiled its expectations for the coming governmental term under four headings: Economic peace, labor peace, social peace and political peace. In line with this, Olpak noted that Turkey needs a “new economic narrative” through the implementation of reforms and further democratization. 

He also voiced MÜSİAD’s concern over Turkey’s trade relations with Moscow after the downing of a Russian warplane by the Turkish military on Nov. 24.

“Of course, it is not possible to say that we have no concerns [on Russian trade],” he said, while also referring to the depth of existing relations between the two countries. 

“The incident could be solved within the framework of international law and [in the] interest of the two countries,” Olpak stated.