Average wages in large Spanish companies are following their own path of increases unrelated to what was happening in a good part of business activity, which expected a wage agreement like the one reached this week by employers and unions. Until last March, this category of salaries in the templates of these corporations increased an average of 5%, according to data released this Friday by the Tax Agency.
The so-called ‘Sales, employment and wages in large companies’ report, which shows an x-ray of these companies although it is a thermometer of all activity due to the tractor effect they have with small suppliers in the country, points out that the growth in the number of recipients of labor income showed a favorable behavior in March, with an increase of 3.8%, without having been affected in this case by the strike of 2022. Likewise, the first quarter closed with an increase of 3.4% , identical to that of the previous quarter, which confirms some stability in the rate of job creation.
For its part, the average gross return in March maintained the increase of 4.8% of the previous month. In the accumulated first quarter, the salary increase is estimated at 5%, an evolution that reflects the progressive incorporation into salary reviews, with a delay and with less intensity, of the rises in the general price level of the last two years.
The V Agreement for Employment and Collective Bargaining (AENC) includes a salary increase of 10% spread over three years, between 2023 and 2025. Among other issues, the salary increase of 4% agreed for 2023 and of a 3% for 2024 and 2025, to which is added a review clause of up to an additional 1% in the event that the interannual CPI for December exceeds what was agreed.
Rebound in billing
On the other hand, the quarterly set of sales of large companies indicates growth of 4%, almost one point above the previous quarter. Only in March these commercial operations rose 8%, six points above the rate registered in February. As explained by the Tax Agency, this strong rise is a consequence, to a large extent, of the negative effect caused by the transport strike in March 2022.
Sales within the country increased by 3.5% in the quarter and by 7.2% in March, a much higher figure than in February as a result of the aforementioned strike. In any case, its month-on-month rate shows a strong advance (3.5%) after the previous two months of contractions.
The activity of corporations shows a strong dynamism, especially in their levels of exports
Depending on their destination, the evolution of these operations in March was quite homogeneous. On the one hand, consumer sales grew by 4.8%, after recovering from last month’s negative data and, on the other hand, capital sales reached a rate of 22.6%.
Breaking down the latter, all its components had a very favorable performance. Those for equipment and software registered a rate of 32.2%, while construction remained positive, increasing by 2.6%.
Exports grew by 5.4% in the quarter and by 10.3% in March, a rate almost eight points higher than that registered in February. According to the Tax Agency, this result reflected the profile shown by its two components, although those destined for the European Union presented greater strength (6% in the quarter and 12.9% in March) than that experienced by the sales to third countries, which increased by 4.8% in the quarter and by 7.1% in March.
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