Profession.hu: Half of employers do not plan to raise salaries next year

In 2024, only 54 percent of companies planned to increase wages this year, but by October 70 percent had already increased salaries by an average of 8 percent, according to Profession.hu’s comprehensive employer survey. Meanwhile, according to Eurostat’s first-quarter data, labor-related expenses in Hungary increased by 10.2 percent, significantly exceeding the EU average.

“Since 2023, there has been a trend that slightly more than half of companies plan to increase wages for the next year, but in the end, more than 70 percent of them increase wages. These are typically smaller than what employees would expect, thus increasing wage pressure on the market. In addition, one of the recurring difficulties for employers is that the salary requirements of those applying for advertised jobs are higher than what is planned for the positions”

– , said Blanka Dencső, senior analyst at Profession.hu, about the results of the survey.

The In addition to changes in the market environment and the performance of the organization, wage development plans for 2026 will continue to be influenced by changes in inflation and workforce retention. The number of vacant positions has decreased dynamically in recent years in Hungary (KSH), while the number of positions advertised on Profession.hu has not changed significantly, making the latter aspect even more important for companies.

Among those decision-makers who have already committed to raising salaries, seven out of ten are aiming to increase the salaries of all their employees by an average of around 8 percent, regardless of position and performance.

48 percent of the responding companies currently provide some kind of fringe benefit to their employees, and a fifth of them are also planning to increase this, also by an average of 8 percent.