Although Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić boasts an average salary of over 100.000 dinars, 800.000 people in Serbia live in absolute poverty, and 60 percent barely make ends meet. The average "pulls out" a few cities, while in other places they make a living
The President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, said today that for the first time in Serbia, the average salary exceeded 100.000 dinars, 855 euros, and 10 years ago it was only 330 euros.
"We received data for average salaries in Serbia for May, in many of our cities. For the first time in our country, the average salary exceeded 100.000 dinars, 855 euros is the average salary, and only 10 years ago it was 330 euros," said Vučić in a video address to citizens on his Instagram profile.
He pointed out that "it shows that Serbia is on an excellent path". Vučić stated that the average salary in Belgrade is 1075 euros, in Novi Sad 982, in Nis 813 and is close to the average of the Republic, while in Bor the average salary is 1025 euros.
He concluded that "good investments and visionary policies yield results", and that by the end of the year, the average salary in Serbia will be more than 900 euros, and next year it will be more than 1000 euros.
"With this, we will make a huge historical difference compared to the period of poverty, unemployment and decline, but the road of responsibility and seriousness is difficult ahead of us, we have to work even harder and harder." Now we know and see that we can, now we see that Serbia can take big steps forward," said Vučić.
He called on the citizens "to unite for our Serbia and achieve everything we agreed to do together by 2027, which is an average salary of 1400 euros and an average pension of 650 euros."
The average salary does not give a realistic picture
Although the average salary of 100.000 dinars looks like a great success on paper, in practice things are somewhat different. The last published data of the Republic Institute of Statistics from April of this year show that at that moment the average salary was about 96.000 dinars, while the median salary was about 74.000 dinars.
In other words, half of the employees earned less than RSD 74.000.
Milojko Arsić, professor at the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade he told "Vreme" that there is no single indicator that best describes the movement and distribution of wages in a country, and it is common for all countries to use both average and median earnings.
He explained that the average wage is an important indicator of how wages move in a country because it is related to macroeconomic trends, the movement of gross domestic product, productivity in a country.
"The difference between average and median wages is an indicator of wage inequality, the bigger the difference, the greater the wage inequality." In our country, the difference is somewhere around 25 percent, which indicates that the inequality is relatively large", Arsić points out.
Belgrade, Novi Sad and Bor "extract" the average
In addition, when it comes to the average salary, the Serbian average "pulls out" only ten cities, wrote in May Local Pres. Of these, only three earn more than RSD 100.000 on average, namely Belgrade, Novi Sad and Bor.
In seven cities, the average salary is higher than 90.000 dinars. This group includes Pančevo, Lajkovac, Lucani, Kragujevac, Majdanpek, Kostolac and Niš. Most have incomes between 70.000 and 80.000 dinars, and 19 cities and municipalities have an average of less than 70.000 dinars, such as Arilje, Rekovac, Aleksandrovac, Raška, Golubac, Bojnik, Vlasotince, Lebane, Crna Trava, Gadžin Han, Merošina, Ražanj, Svrljig , Bela Palanka, Vranjska Banja, Bosilegrad, Bujanovac, Preševo and Blace.
Many survive on seasonal jobs
President of the Association of Free and Independent Trade Unions Ranka Savić told "Vreme" that their research shows that even the average, let alone medial income, is not enough for a normal life.
"In Belgrade and Novi Sad, respondents said that they need about 140.000 dinars per month, and in the rest of Serbia, primarily in the south, the majority answer was about 100.000 dinars." That surprised me," Savić added.
And while some cities "extract" the average, it is known that the standard is the worst in the south of Serbia, that average wages do not follow those in the rest of the country, and that workers' rights are often violated. It is not uncommon for people to take on extra jobs to make ends meet. This kind of practice is especially present in the south of Serbia, said the "Vremena" interlocutor.
"We asked people in the south of Serbia whether they do seasonal work. They do, and massively. Many people go to Bulgaria and Greece in the summer and survive on that basis. With what they have here, they wouldn't be able to make ends meet," adds Savić.
12 percent of people live in absolute poverty
Agencies within the UN (Unicef) made a projection of poverty in Serbia for the year 2023, and the data showed that 12,1 percent of Serbian citizens, or 800 thousand, are in absolute poverty.
At the same time, out of 800.000 citizens who are in absolute poverty and who cannot meet even the basic needs of life, only every fifth person receives cash social assistance, "which is a very low coverage", said psychologist and researcher Sara Bradaš from the Center for Democracy for N1.
"Also, the amount of aid is small - I calculated that the limit of absolute poverty for an individual in 2023 was 17 thousand dinars, and the financial aid was lower than 11.500 thousand dinars." "Even the small number who receive money do not have enough to meet their basic needs," said Bradaš.
A third of citizens skip meals
According to the latest research by the United Nations Children's Fund, every eighth resident of Serbia has less than 12.000 dinars per month, which is twice as much as in 2022.
The Ipsos agency conducted a survey according to which 10 percent of respondents in Serbia said that in the last six months they were in a situation where they could not meet the basic needs of their children (meals, health care costs, school costs, clothes).
In the same survey, 41 percent of respondents say that their income is only enough to survive the month, while 30 percent of them say that their income is not enough to survive.
The Ipsos survey also showed that a large number of citizens (60 percent) ask family or friends to lend them money, 46 percent do not turn on the heating even though they are cold, 41 percent do not go to the doctor even though they have health problems, and 34 percent skip meals even though they are hungry.
Source: FoNet/N1/Local press
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