President Abinader accompanied by officials and representatives of the business and union sectors at the time of announcing the increase in the minimum wage for construction workers. ( FREE DIARY/EDDY VITTINI )
President Luis Abinader and the Minister of Labor, Luis Miguel De Camps, announced a 24% increase in the minimum wage for construction workers this Monday, of which 21% will be applied on May 1 and an additional 3% in October.
The decision results from a consensus between workers, businessmen, and government representatives. It will impact plumbers, masons, carpenters, electricians, painters, rodders, and construction workers.
The government considers each of the above jobs as an individual sector. With these, there are seven beneficiaries of the increases in the minimum wage achieved with the mediation of the president.
In this way, salary readjustments total 14. Some of the previous ones affected employees of private companies, sugarcane workers, tourism workers, farmers, heavy machine operators in the construction area, and NGO workers.
Pedro Julio Alcántara, the representative of the construction workers, explained that the lowest salary, which unskilled workers earn for an eight-hour day, will go from 700 to 900 pesos, and a bricklayer, from the lowest category, will go from 1,300 to 1,600 pesos.
The Minister of Labor said that later they would announce the resolutions with all the more than 400 detailed rates that will rise.
Pedro Brache, president of the National Council of Private Enterprise (Conep), welcomed the decision and considered it a “substantial increase.” However, the most important thing is that we have worked together and agreed,” said the businessman.
The act was attended by the vice president of CONEP, Cesar Dargam; the director of Infotep, Rafael Santos Badía; the general director of the Salaries Committee of the Ministry of Labor, Ángel Martín Mieses; the executive director of Copardom, Pedro Rodríguez; the president of the CNUS, Rafael -Pepe- Abreu; the vice president of the CNUS and president of Fenticommc, Pedro Julio Alcántara; the president of Constructora Bisonó, Rafael Vitelio Bisonó “Don Tato” and his son Juan Antonio Bisonó.
Also present were the executive director of Hageco, Michel Youd El – Hage; of Cpardom, Erick Bueno; and the presidents of Capocon, Eduardo Domínguez Imbert; from Acoprovi, Jorge Montalvo; from the CASC, Gabriel Del Río; and from the CNTD, Jacobo Ramos, among other trade union and business representatives.