Trenkwalder: The average hourly wage of manual workers will exceed 2,100 forints by the end of 2024

Trenkwalder, which deals with labor leasing and mediation, processed the wage data of almost 7,000 employees. The announcement quotes Viktor Hamrák, Trenkwalder’s service director, who said that although the increase in manual hourly wages was single-digit during the calendar year, a one-time effect must also be taken into account in order to properly interpret the numbers: last year, the minimum wage increase was exceptionally brought forward by one month, so its effect was already reflected in December wages, and the current data is compared to a higher base.

He added that, after filtering out the one-off effect, their estimates show that the annual wage increase among manual workers was between 14-15 percent, which means that the real wage increase was around 10 percent.

They also discussed the geographical breakdown, according to which the average manual hourly wage will remain below 2,000 forints by the end of 2024 in three regions: Northern Hungary, the Northern Great Plain and Southern Transdanubia; in these areas, the value typically ranges between 1,750-1,900 forints. In the other regions, hourly wages between 2,050-2,250 forints are typical, but Central Hungary and the capital “spectacularly” stand out from the field: the average hourly wage is again approaching the 2,900 forint level, similar to the previous quarter.

At the same time, the consulting and auditing firm Moore Hungary examined the salary data of almost 500 middle managers working at the Hungarian subsidiaries of more than 60 international companies. For employees working in the monthly gross salary range between 800 thousand and 1.2 million forints, the salary increase was 9.6 percent on average in the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to the same period of the previous year.

Péter Hajnal, managing partner of Moore Hungary, pointed out in the announcement that last year, the annual salary settlement for intellectual middle managers typically took place in January, therefore the annual salary increase rate of close to ten percent means that the real salary increase in this salary category was 5-6 percent.