While the workers are waiting for the Government to announce how much the wage increase will be single basic salary (SBU) for 2024, companies – between national and multinational – already have an increase projection that they independently predict for the next year. That’s what the study reveals Ecuador 2024: a new business horizon. Challenges and opportunities conducted by Andeanecuador Consultores Estratégicos CL, a member company of Deloitte Consulting.

In the Deloitte report, presented this Thursday, December 14 in Guayaquil, 220 companies participated, and 80% of them reported a salary increase projection of an average of 4.20%; 17% state that they will not make an increase, while 3% have not yet decided.

The definition of the basic salary for 2024 is being extended

Roberto Estrada, a partner at the firm, said that for 2023, 84 percent of those 220 companies that reported 154,709 workers increased wages by 4.83 percent, while 16 percent did not receive any increase.

According to the study, national companies in their projection plan a growth of 4.54% compared to 5.33% in 2023, while multinational companies 3.58% compared to 3.89% this year. “National companies are still above multinationals in terms of salary increase in the country”, he commented.

Although there is a difference between national and multinational companies, Estrada pointed out that they have other types of benefits that can compensate for that difference.

2024 Base Wage: Employers Propose Increase of $4.12 According to Technical Parameters

Regarding the number of employees, domestic companies reported that they started the year with 101,514 and ended with 97,374 employees, which means a drop of -4%. While multinational companies started with 53,195 employees and ended with a decrease of -1%.

The report also states that the economic sector with the highest projection is the industrial group with 4.42%, followed by the commercial sector (4.19%); and services (3.94%).

Looking at different industries, the average increase for the next year is led by insurance with 5.15%; technology (4.41%); automotive with (4.12%); pharmacist with (3.98%); and broad consumption (3.94%).

In this indicator, Estrada explained that although in insurance and technology it is maintained compared to what it was in 2023, there is a variation in the third group, the construction group has been replaced by the automotive sector that “this had a very interesting dynamic of the year, that it will and next year there will be zero tariffs on European vehicles and that there will be a lot of movement within what are also brands, girls,” he said.

As for the base salary, he indicated that the accumulated SBU increase from 2014 to 2023 was 32%. In 2014, it was 340 dollars, and currently it is 450 dollars.

The salary increase that will be applied to the basic salary from January will be defined by the Ministry of Labor by December 22after the representatives of workers and employers did not reach an agreement on the establishment of SBU. The workers demanded that it be equated with the cost of the vital basket, whose price as of November is USD 552.02, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INEC), while businessmen proposed an increase of $4.12, a value derived from technical parameters, but since this sector remains in the hands of the Government, it means that it corresponds to $9.32 based on projected inflation.