Egypt to allocate roughly LE 150 billion per year to raise state employees’ wages, pensions: Minister

CAIRO – 4 March 2023: Egypt will allocate roughly LE 150 billion per year in order to raise the state employees’ minimum wages and pensions in implementation of President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi’s directives, Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait said on Saturday.

Maait highlighted the state’s efforts to start paying higher wages and pensions to beneficiaries starting April.

He affirmed that the decisions come within the state’s efforts to contain the largest portion possible of the global inflation wave and alleviate the burden on citizens.

On Thursday, President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi announced a bundle of raises for public employees, pensioners, and beneficiaries of the monetary subsidies program that will be effective starting April 1.

Sisi instructed raising the salaries of public employees with the monthly minimum of the raise being LE 1,000. Further, the minimum wage for public employees will be LE 3,500, while that of master’s and PhD holders at public institutions will be LE6,000 and LE7,000, respectively.

The president also decided to raise the maximum amount of tax-exempted annual income to LE30,000 up from LE24,000. On the other hand, pensions will increase by 15 percent, and monetary subsidies disbursed within Takaful w Karama social protection program, will go up by 25 percent.

This comes while developing countries, including Egypt, have been suffering from rising inflation and a hike in prices of commodities amid the global economic crisis.

Egypt has also resorted to devaluating its currency more than once over the past year amid the economic crisis, which caused the pound to hit a record low of around LE 30 against the US dollar.