Minimum wage and maximum demagoguery
That the minimum wage must be updated to bring it as close as possible to the real cost of living is a matter of social justice, and that the PSOE and Sumar governments have done more to increase the minimum wage than the PP governments (which only raised it by 94 euros in seven years) is an easily verifiable objective truth. Rajoy left office in 2018 with a minimum wage of 735 euros, and this week the Sánchez government has raised it to 1,221. But then came Sánchez's demagoguery, cloaked in the guise of championing the poor: "It is unacceptable that, in a context of economic prosperity, the wages of those earning the minimum are scrutinized, while multimillion-euro profits are ignored." To begin with, there are around thirty companies with multimillion-euro profits in Spain, with the major banks leading the way. But among the rest, the vast majority are doing what they can, because profit margins have been shrinking and it's increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to compete on price with large corporations while complying with all labor and tax obligations. Lumping everyone together with the phrase "Corporate profit escalation" is like painting a broad, unflattering picture of the multitude of small and medium-sized business owners and entrepreneurs who are struggling to make ends meet at the end of the month.
If the Spanish government's argument is that there is now "a context of economic prosperity," let's ask ourselves why the government isn't ending social exclusion or why so many people aren't feeling the effects in their wallets. Perhaps it's not so easy. For many companies, it isn't. And it seems it isn't for the Spanish government either.