Groups of employees eligible for the regional minimum wage increase from July 2022 in Vietnam

The news of the regional minimum wage increase has been welcomed with joys by many employees who are currently at or around the minimum wage in Vietnam. However, although they may receive the same or similar salary, there are many other employees who won’t get an increase from this policy. So, who are the groups of employees eligible for the regional minimum wage increase from July 2022 in Vietnam?

Decree 38/2022/ND-CP on the change in the regional minimum wage in Vietnam was issued to explain clearly the increase in the regional minimum wage for employees.

For employees working in private enterprises with a salary lower than the current minimum wage, they will get an increase to that amount, or higher depending on the enterprise.

Although most people thought that all employees will benefit from Decree 38, in reality, there are some cases in which the employees will not get a rise in their paycheck. 

Employees do not get an increase in salary 

However, civil servants, public employees, or employees working in the state receiving salary in the form of basic salary without any change in regime will not have their salary increase according to the new change in July.

Plus, the employees who currently receive a salary equal to or higher than the new regional minimum wage will also not get an increase. The enterprises might consider an increase for them but it is not mandatory as many employees have thought.

Besides, employees should also take notes on the economic zones that they are in. This is because the salary might not change in the way they thought it would be if the region gets a reclassification in the economic zone.

For example, the employees currently in economic zone 1 but get reclassified as economic zone 2 or 3 will technically get an increase in minimum wage like everyone else but the reduction might be larger than the increase, making it seems like the change in July actually affects them negatively. 

Lastly, it should be noted that there are no changes in the 7% increase for employees that perform jobs or titles that require vocational training. Therefore, if a college graduate in region 1 gets 4,73 million VND minimum wage before (the minimum wage of 4,42 million VND), now, they will receive 5 million VND minimum wage with the minimum wage of 4,68 million VND.

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