Eurostat: In 2021, Bulgaria has lowest minimum wage in EU
As of January 2021, Bulgaria has the lowest minimum wage among European Union countries, EU statistics agency Eurostat said on February 5.
Currrently, 21 out of the 27 EU member states have national minimum wages. Only Denmark, Italy, Cyprus, Austria, Finland and Sweden do not.
The 21 EU member states that have national minimum wages can be divided into three main groups based on their levels in euro, Eurostat said.
In January 2021, 10 member states, in the eastern part of the EU, had minimum wages below 700 euro per month: Bulgaria (332 euro), Hungary (442 euro), Romania (458 euro), Latvia (500 euro), Croatia (563 euro), Czech Republic (579 euro), Estonia (584 euro), Poland (614 euro), Slovakia (623 euro) and Lithuania (642 euro).
In five other member states, mainly in the south of the EU, minimum wages ranged between 700 euro and just more than 1100 euro a month: Greece (758 euro), Portugal (776 euro), Malta (785 euro), Slovenia (1024 euro) and Spain (1108 euro).
In the remaining six member states, all in the west and north of the EU, minimum wages were above 1500 euro a month: France (1555 euro), Germany (1614 euro), Belgium (1626 euro), the Netherlands (1685 euro), Ireland (1724 euro) and Luxembourg (2202 euro).
Across the 21 member states concerned, the highest minimum wage in the EU was 6.6 times higher than the lowest, Eurostat said.
The statistics agency said that however, the disparities in minimum wages across the EU member states are considerably smaller once price level differences are taken into account.
When expressed in purchasing power standard (PPS), minimum wages in member states with lower price levels become relatively higher and relatively lower in member states with higher price levels.
By eliminating price differences, minimum wages ranged from 623 PPS per month in Bulgaria to 1668 PPS in Luxembourg. Looked at this way, the highest minimum wage was 2.7 times higher than the lowest.
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