The Costa Rica News (TCRN) – The president of Costa Rica, Laura Chinchilla, froze, for the fourth consecutive year, the salaries of senior government officials as an austerity measure, official sources said.
The mandatory order applies to her, and her two deputies, ministers, deputy ministers, chief executives of public and decentralized public sector managers.
Costa Rican Minister of Labour, Olman Segura, said in a statement that this is “a clear sign of the effort of the Executive to approve the largest possible adjustment to wages of other workers in the public sector”.
She said he also intended to “show austerity wages of those in high places and in this way help contain the growth of public spending”.
Chinchilla has applied this guideline in view of the high fiscal deficit facing the country close to 5% of gross domestic product (GDP).
This measure was announced at a time when the government and the unions negotiate wage increases in the public sector for the second half of 2013.
Unions call at least 6% increase, which the government has said it is impossible to meet.
This week a defined amount for increase is expected for the second half of the year. EFE
The Costa Rica News (TCRN)
San Jose Costa Rica
