Taipei: Inflation-adjusted wages in Taiwan's industrial and service sectors showed the strongest growth in 11 years during the first seven months of the year, according to government data released Monday. Real aggregate earnings outpaced consumer price growth, setting a record for this period.

According to Focus Taiwan, the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) reported that average monthly regular wages, adjusted for inflation, rose 1.12 percent year-on-year to NT$44,113 (US$1,389) from January to July. This reflects the most significant rise since 2020, when wages increased by 1.71 percent.

Real average aggregate earnings, which include regular wages and non-regular income like overtime and bonuses, grew 2.33 percent year-on-year to NT$434,420. This marks the fastest growth for the January-July period since 2015, when they increased by 4.24 percent.

Before inflation adjustments, average monthly regular wages increased by 2.94 percent from the previous year to NT$49,054, while average aggregate earnings rose by 4.18 percent to NT$483,077, according to DGBAS data.

In July alone, average monthly regular wages saw a 3.32 percent increase from the previous year to NT$49,491, and average monthly aggregate earnings rose by 8.25 percent to NT$71,165. The median monthly regular wage was NT$39,629 in July, showing a 3.47 percent increase from the previous year. For full-time employees, the median monthly regular wage was NT$41,397, marking a 4.04 percent increase year-on-year.

Tan Wen-ling, deputy director of the DGBAS Census Department, indicated that wage growth outpaced inflation in the first seven months, with the consumer price index (CPI) rising by an average of 1.8 percent. However, she cautioned that recent faster inflation, with CPI rising more than 2 percent, could undermine real wage gains in the future.

Additionally, Tan highlighted that based on Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) criteria, approximately 1.26 million full-time Taiwanese workers, or 16.8 percent of the total, earned less than the OECD's low-pay threshold in 2024. This threshold, based on Taiwan's 2024 data, was around NT$390,000 annually. The monthly equivalent was about NT$27,598, less than Taiwan's minimum monthly wage of NT$29,500, indicating that nearly no full-time domestic workers would be classified as low-paid based on monthly regular wages. However, some do fall below the annual threshold due to little or no bonuses or profit-sharing income in certain industries.