Information for this page was compiled during December 2023 and January 2024. As Member States are currently transposing the EU minimum wage directive, national legislation can be subject to change. Eurofound intends to update these profiles in early 2025. Users are invited to contact Eurofound if they are aware of changes.
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The Labour Code (art. 164) stipulates that the government sets the minimum wage for full-time (8 hours per day) employment and that employers are not allowed to pay less.
The Labour Code also stipulates that the minimum wage is set by Government decision. The periodic updating of the minimum wage is instituted by the adopting of a new Government decision. The latest one is Decision nr. 900/2023, which came into force on 28 September 2023.
Theoretically, according to Law 174/2020, a living wage is a priority target for the minimum wage policy. Law 174/2020 provides a method for estimating the living wage at a national level and stipulates that the minimum wage should be set while considering this estimate. It also stipulates that the National Institute of Statistics should calculate and officially publish the living wage estimate periodically. Even though Law 174/2020 was passed via normal parliamentary procedure with support from the Social Democratic Party that is now in power and has been in force since 2020, it has not had any effect on the country’s minimum wage policy. The National Institute of Statistics has declined not to publish the living wage estimate, claiming technical errors in the text of the law prevent it from doing so. In the absence of official figures, government officials have ignored the provisions of Law 174/2020. As such, only a part of the trade union movement still insists on making Law 174/2020 functional.
The minimum wage is set by the government, after consulting with nationally representative employer and trade union confederations. This practice abides by art. 164 of the Labour Code. The organisations are the following:
Trade unions:
Employers:
The Labour Code stipulates only that the government must consult with employers’ organizations and trade unions before setting the minimum wage. According to the Social Dialogue Law (Law 367/2022 replacing Law 62/2011), consultations take place within the framework of the National Tripartite Council. The agenda for the Council meetings is set by the government, which means that there is no official fixed rule when it comes to updating the minimum wage — for example, there is no regulated calendar. In practice, the minimum wage is updated annually, either towards the end or at the beginning of the year.
There are no mandatory criteria in setting the minimum wage. Law 174/2020 stipulates that the government should primarily take into consideration the requirement for a decent standard of living (defined based on the value of a set basket of goods and services) but so far, this legal provision has not been applied for the refusal by the National Institute of Statistics to publish an estimate, on the basis of potential technical issues in the law preventing it from doing so . Over the past decade, the idea of coming up with an ‘objective’ mechanism for setting the minimum wage was circulated by employers and politicians. One option was to set up an ‘expert committee’ that could independently assess the minimum wage policy, but this was not put into practice. Another option was to use indicators such as inflation and labour productivity growth. This was in fact implemented in 2019, when the minimum wage was raised at a rate equal to the sum between inflation and productivity growth. This was subsequently abandoned with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The minimum wage is universally binding, according to art. 164 of the Labour Code. All employees are covered.
There is no legal possibility for a full-time employee to earn less than the minimum wage. The only possibility for an employee to earn less than the minimum wage is by working part-time. For part-time employees the minimum wage is calculated by multiplying the number of hours worked per month by the hourly minimum rate stipulated in the latest government decision.
In response to the significant increase in the number of employees earning the minimum wage, the government introduced an amendment to the Labour Code (art. 164) stipulating that an employee can be paid the minimum wage only for the first 24 months of an individual labour contract. This policy applies starting with 1 January 2022 and its effects have not been assessed yet — as their effects in practice should become apparent starting from January 2024 (i.e. two years later the entry into force of the provision).
Higher minimum wages are legally stipulated for the agriculture, construction, and the food industry. The higher minimum wage for construction was introduced in January 2019 (Government Emergency Ordinance 114/2018, art. 71), while for agriculture and the food industry it has been in place since June 2022 (Law 135/2022, art. III). Technically speaking, these are dealt separately from the statutory minimum wage. Following the most recent increase of the statutory minimum wage (RON 3,300 from 1 October 2023), the government increased the minimum wage for the construction sector to RON 4,582 and for agriculture and the food industry to RON 3,436 (Government Emergency Ordinance 93/2023) starting with 1 November 2023. This was justified by the claimed need to continue to support activity in these sectors and to avoid potentially negative consequences for the national economy. Higher minimum wages in these sectors are supported by tax exemptions (more precisely, social contributions exemptions). Romanian authorities have committed to eliminate such exemptions by 2028 — this is targeted in the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.
The government decisions setting the minimum wage usually define it as both monthly and hourly rates, also specifying the ‘normal’ number of hours worked per month — for 2023, for example, it is 165.333 hours per month; this varies from year to year depending on the number of legal working days. For full-time workers the monthly rate is normally employed, and the hourly rate is mostly employed to aid calculations for part-time employees. Minimum wage earners receive 12 payments per year, one corresponding to each month of the year.
The minimum wage is legally defined as the base wage (Labour Code arts. 164 and 165), so it cannot include any bonuses or other elements. There are also no possibilities of deductions, which are explicitly forbidden by the Labour Code (arts. 164 and 165). The complete legal name for the minimum wage in Romania is ‘the country-wide base gross minimum wage guaranteed to be paid’ (salariul de bază minim brut pe țară garantat în plată).
According to art. 165 of the Labour Code, for employees whose employer, according to the collective or individual employment contract, provides them with food, accommodation or other facilities, the amount in money due for the work performed cannot be lower than the minimum salary gross per country provided by law.
There are no regular reports on the minimum wage in Romania. Occasional research is likewise scarce.