Bloomberg — Brazil’s central bank workers decided to suspend their strike for now but will continue protesting for higher salaries through daily work stoppages.
The union representing the bank’s workers rejected a government proposal to increase their wages by 5% and insisted on a 27% raise, proposing that such an adjustment is made on July 1 rather than retroactively to January 1, according to a statement published Tuesday. They could resume their strike in early May if negotiations fail, the statement added.
“This counteroffer reduces the monetary impact of our demands, so it fits in the budget,” Fabio Faiad, president of the bank’s union, said in a phone interview.
The central bank said it wouldn’t comment on the union’s decision. A bank spokesperson said the institution will release economic reports delayed by the strike as soon as possible, giving a 24-hour notice prior to publication. That includes data on credit, fiscal and external sectors, as well as a weekly survey on economist expectations for inflation and interest rates.
Public servants from the central bank and the economy ministry have been staging strikes and work stoppages as they protest against years of inflation that’s eroded their purchasing power. Consumer prices in Brazil are currently rising more than 11% a year, their fastest pace in two decades.
President Jair Bolsonaro’s proposal to increase wages of federal public servants by 5% would cost public coffers 6.3 billion reais ($1.4 billion) this year. The government would need to implement deep cuts in current expenditures to find budget space for such a raise without breaching the country’s spending cap rule.
