Page 23 - bne IntelliNews Ukraine Country Report May 2017

4.4 Labour and income
4.4.1 Labour market, unemployment dynamics
Source: ICU
Unemployment rate (%)
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 EFFF
6.4 6.4 8.8 8.1 7.9 7.5 7.2 9.3 9.1 9.3 8.9 8.6 8.3
4.4.2 Nominal wages dynamics
Ukraine doubles minimum wage without negative impact. Ukraine was one of only two countries in the Former Soviet Union where incomes are still below the levels of 1991, the year of the collapse. The government responded by doubling the minimum wage in October 2016 to UAH3,200 per month ($110) that went into effect at the start of January this year and so far there has been no negative economic impact.
The new minimum wage will affect two out of five workers in Ukraine (42%), but while employees will be pleased the increase comes with negative impact for the economy.
Firstly it will make struggling state-owned enterprises (SOE) struggle even more, that could lead to rising unemployment, according to Robert Kirchner, Philipp Engler and Olga Kupets of the German Advisory Group Ukraine (GAGU), a government sponsored technical assistance think tank.
Before the change, Ukraine’s minimum wage was only about a quarter of the
23 RUSSIA Country Report April 2017 www.intellinews.com