Parliament's Support for Government in Wage Suppression

As the meetings for wage determination in the Supreme Labor Council approach, concerns about the renewed suppression of workers' wages in Iran have risen, fueled by the defense of regional wages at the Parliament's Research Center. The ILNA news agency, affiliated with the government organization 'House of Workers,' reported that while the wage meetings of the Supreme Labor Council are nearing, some experts aligned with the government and employers are also beating the drum for 'provincial housing rights.' ILNA emphasized that the discussion of regional wages is one of the claims made by employers and the government in recent years during wage discussions in the Supreme Labor Council, which has been promoted annually by spokespeople from the Chamber of Commerce, the Parliament's Research Center, and the Planning and Budget Organization and the Ministry of Labor following the implementation of the targeted subsidy plan. ILNA also pointed to the economic, social, and security implications of regional wages, noting that despite this, every year some spokespeople repeat their statements. One of the arguments used to justify regional wage differentiation is the claim of a tenfold difference in rent prices between Tehran and some provinces. However, ILNA refuted this claim, stating that comparing housing with the minimum area that workers can afford in working-class areas of Tehran with a worker city like Ilam reveals the falsehood of this assertion. According to the report, the minimum price for full rent for small homes in Ilam is less than 200 million tomans, while in newly built areas of Islamshahr, it ranges from 250 to 350 million tomans. A review of housing rental prices in various cities also shows that there is not much difference between the working-class and poor areas in Tehran and other cities. This is precisely the point that critics and labor activists cite, assessing the justifications of the government, employers, and the Parliament's Research Center as a means to suppress workers' wages. In this context, a labor activist stated, 'Currently, the minimum subsistence basket for a worker's household in the country is about 30 million tomans, while workers' wages have reached 10 million tomans.' The figure of 3.3 refers to the household calculation criteria in Iran, indicating calculations based on the expenses of three adults and one minor. Mehrdad Darani emphasized, 'In this situation, we are 300 percent behind the fair real wage, but some want to use the excuse of regional wages and different housing rights to first increase wages by less than 40 percent in these conditions and then increase housing rights in other provinces by only 10 percent instead of the same amount.'