The average total monthly gross compensation per employee recorded growth of 5.6%, reaching 1,694 euros in 2025. The amount represents an increase of 39 euros per month and 0.9 percentage points in relation to the targets established in the “Tripartite Agreement on Salary Valorization and Economic Growth 2025-2028”.
The Ministry of Labor, Solidarity and Social Security sent the note to newsrooms this Sunday. Still, productivity per working hour in Portugal is 28% below the European Union (EU) average, while wages remain 35% below the same benchmark.
“For the average salary to continue to be revised upwards, in a sustainable way, Portugal must move from a model exclusively focused on tax incentives to a model that combines tax incentives with real productivity gains”, highlights Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho, Minister of Labor, Solidarity and Social Security, cited in a statement.
Regarding the increase above the agreement’s targets, the government official emphasizes that “these results reflect a paradigm shift in the Portuguese economy, based on three fundamental axes”. The first axis is the Tripartite Agreement on Wage Valorization and Economic Growth 2025-2028”.
The document was signed on October 1, 2024 by the Government and Social Partners. The ministry highlights that the signing marks a change, “after a long period of accelerated compression of the salary scale, between 2015 and 2023”, with the ratio between the average wage and the minimum wage now showing the first signs of stabilization. Another factor highlighted is the “salary increase negotiated for different professional groups”.
The second axis is related to the fact that salary growth was led by the private sector of tradable goods and services, with an increase of 6.3%. “This difference demonstrates that the business community, especially the exporting sectors of the Brazilian economy, are mobilizing the instruments created by the Executive”, highlights the ministry.
Among the initiatives stand out exemption from IR and TSU on productivity bonuses, up to a limit of 6% of the annual base salaryas well as the increase in the IRPJ tax benefit for salary increases equal to or greater than 4.6%. This increase is applied transversally and without the previous corset of the salary range.
Finally, Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho’s office explains that “income policy allowed the nominal increase to translate into a real gain in purchasing power of 3.2% for families”. The data consolidates the trajectory that began in 2024, the year in which Portugal recorded the largest real increase in income in the OECD context (“OECD Employment Outlook 2024”).
amanda.lima@dn.pt
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