Economy 12 March 2025, 4:15pm

What 25-50% pay rise? This also exists in Hungary

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Average wages in Hungary rose by 13% in 2024. But for many, the increase was much smaller or even larger. KSH's experimental statistics show how big the gap is between wage growth rates, and which sectors were the big winners in 2024.

This article will answer the following questions:

How did wages change in Hungary in 2024?
Do we really find examples of 25-50% wage increases?
How did the specific sectors fare in respect of wage increases?
How much did the purchasing power of earnings grow?

In 2024, the dynamic earnings growth continued in Hungary, with the average gross earnings of full-time employees increasing by 13.2% in nominal terms compared to the same period of the previous year, the KSH said.

"This was largely driven by the 15% and 10% increases in the minimum wage and guaranteed minimum wage implemented at the end of last year, as well as by pre-scheduled wage rises in public service sectors (especially the measures taken in public education and vocational training, the second stage of wage increase for health professionals, and the wage increases in the armed forces) and announced wage increases in large public enterprises and commercial chains. In addition, the wage-raising effect of additional labour demand was still significant in some economic branches."

There were significant differences behind the growth at the economy-wide level.

Nearly 90% of individuals with full-time jobs saw their gross earnings rise compared to the same period of the previous year. Nearly six out of ten employees had an increase between 5.0 and 24.9%. However, mainly as a result of a slower pace of earnings growth in the private sector, the proportion of those who experienced an increase in earnings of at least 15% was 9.7 percentage points lower than in 2023.

The change in earnings is not only driven by the change in the basic wages, but is also significantly influenced by, for example, the number of hours worked, the direct remuneration, the amount of additional payments, bonuses and premiums, and their timing or non-payment. In addition, changes in workers' responsibilities, jobs and employers also affect their earnings.

In 2024, the distribution of the change in earnings was influenced by the dynamic growth of regular earnings and the moderate growth of non-regular earnings (premiums, bonuses, 13th month and additional monthly payments).

However, as the graph above shows, more than 20% of employees have seen their pay rise by more than 25% in the last year. Of these, 5% saw their pay rise by more than 50%.

Differences across economic branches are also clearly marked in the distribution of earnings changes.
As a result of the rise in teachers’ salaries in January, education continued to have the largest and most extensive increase in wages, affecting the highest number of employees.
Human health and social work activities as well as water and waste management also had a great share of workers with a salary increase of over 25% and one of the least share of workers with decreasing earnings. This was also driven by the wage rises for health professionals and water management workers.
The moderate pace of gross earnings growth in manufacturing is reflected by the fact that this sector had one of the highest proportions of employees with declining earnings and one of the lowest proportions of employees with wage increases above 15%.

As a result of the significant rise in nominal earnings and a marked decrease in inflation, the share of individuals whose net earnings fell in real terms decreased to 18.0% from 61.8% compared to the previous year.