Commission meeting is only days away: The street will set the wage not the table

Bilge Su Yıldırım

The Minimum Wage Commission will hold its first meeting in the first week of December to set the minimum wage that will apply in 2026. Although the Commission consists of government, employer and worker representatives, Türk-İş, the only workers’ confederation with decision-making power at the table, has announced it will not attend. With Türk-İş refusing to take part on the grounds that ‘the structure of the commission is unfair’, only the government and employers will sit at the table. The Ministry of Labour and Social Security represents the government and the Turkish Confederation of Employer Associations (TİSK) represents employers, while DİSK and Hak-İş have no decision-making power.

The minimum wage in Turkey no longer enters the public agenda only because it influences general wage increases. Under the AKP’s pro-capital policies and the deepening economic crisis, the minimum wage has ceased to be a ‘basic labour wage’ and has become the average wage among labour income. Turkey leads European countries in the number of minimum wage workers. According to this, 11.2 million people in Turkey work for the minimum wage. Eurostat data shows that the number of minimum wage workers in Turkey is higher than the total number in around 20 EU countries. While 12.8 million people in 21 EU countries work for their national minimum wages, the number in England is around 1.9 million and in Turkey 11.2 million.

France follows Turkey with 3.5 million minimum wage workers and Germany with 3.2 million. In other words, the number of minimum wage workers in Turkey is more than three times that of its closest competitor.

TÜRK-İŞ IS AVOIDING RESPONSIBILITY

As the minimum wage becomes more widespread among waged workers, half the population is directly affected by the wage to be set. In this sense, the demand for a ‘wage worthy of human dignity’ goes beyond a table that determines the right to speak by the number of members. BİRTEK-SEN Chair Mehmet Türkmen assessed the situation for BirGün ahead of the commission meeting.

He stressed that a decent minimum wage is only possible through the united and organised struggle of the working class, and said: “In my view, Türk-İş announcing even before the table is set that it will not attend points to a much lower minimum wage rise this year compared to previous years. In previous years Ergün Atalay also walked away from the table and acted as if he were protesting it. In this year’s talks he is avoiding taking responsibility from the outset. Türk-İş has over 1 million members, it is the largest workers’ confederation in the country. If it objects to the structure of this commission it should organise this reaction within the class. Yet Chair Atalay dares to say ‘Our members don’t work for the minimum wage anyway’. This actually shows the state of the organised strength of the working class and is evidence of the gravity of the situation. Is it possible that Ergün Atalay does not know that the minimum wage is the biggest collective agreement in this country that the rise in all labour incomes at the start of the year is determined by the minimum wage rise? Of course he knows but Atalay, who claims to represent more than 1 million workers, does not share the same misery as those workers. That is why he can make such a statement and act as if he has no responsibility if he does not go to the table.”

SALVATION LIES IN ORGANISED STRUGGLE

Türkmen also commented on the duties of unions in organising the demand for a minimum wage that allows a decent life. He underlined that labour incomes have fallen to the lowest level in Turkey’s history, and said: “On the eve of setting such an important wage that concerns all sections living on their labour, the inactivity of unions across the country shows the state of the organised strength of the working class. At this stage every formation that defines itself as a union must think seriously. Current conditions can only improve through the working class coming together, speaking out and expressing organised objection, and every union must organise this demand wherever it is active. They should mobilise all their members and even non-union workers and build a struggle around the demand for a decent minimum wage. Actions should be organised in every part of the country. I find the minimum wage march organised the other day under the call of the Gebze Unions’ Association and the involvement of Birleşik Metal-İş and Petrol-İş very important. Such examples should be expanded. All unions should embrace this demand by saying ‘The minimum wage is the issue of the entire working class’. We also visit factories and hold meetings. Last year we fought against the imposition of minimum wage-level rises in many textile factories in Antep Başpınar. Despite bans by the governor’s office, obstacles and pressures such as my imprisonment, we eventually won rises of 30–40 percent in Başpınar factories. We achieved this even before we gained collective bargaining authority due to low membership numbers when we had only a thousand members. Imagine what large confederations and unions could achieve if they acted in an organised way. Only if this organised struggle is built can the working class free itself from poverty wages and conditions of servitude.”

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THE HUNGER LINE PASSED 30,000 LIRA

As the minimum wage debate enters the public agenda, the hunger line has already passed 30,000 lira. According to Birleşik Kamu-İş, the hunger line rose by 266 lira in November to 30,061 lira, while the poverty line reached 93,697 lira due to rising prices in non-food groups such as clothing, housing and transport. The hunger line rose 8,061 lira above the current minimum wage. The total of four minimum wages fell 5,281 lira short of the poverty line.

According to Birleşik Kamu-İş’s November 2025 Hunger-Poverty Line Report based on the basic food and non-food spending of a family of four, the poverty line rose 1,459 lira from October. The annual rise reached 24,016 lira. The sharpest increases in the food group in November were in meat, eggs, milk and dairy. Meat-fish-eggs spending rose by 208 lira to 9,323 lira, and milk-yoghurt-cheese spending rose by 65 lira to 6,314 lira.

Total food spending, that is the hunger line, rose by 7,762 lira compared to November 2024. According to the detailed non-food compulsory spending in the report, in November a family of four spent 18,673 lira on housing (including rent), 17,264 lira on transport, 2,433 lira on clothing and footwear and 7,276 lira on household goods.

Note: This article is translated from the original article titled Komisyonun toplanmasına günler kaldı: Ücreti masa değil sokak belirleyecek, published in BirGün newspaper on November 28, 2025.