Pay hike: Companies should help workers who guided them to fortune

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The pandemic has wreaked havoc to most families and the middle-class, who have neither the resource cushion of the rich nor the eligibility to benefit for the welfare schemes of the Central and state government, are often the hardest hit. Most of the middle class comprises salaried individuals, who have suffered terribly since March 2020, when the national lockdown impacted the economy like nothing earlier. Millions lost jobs and most of those who managed to hold on to their salary suffered deep salary cuts that ranged from 10% to 50% and even more. Most salary and wage cuts took place last year and many companies are continuing with it this year too.

In this situation, an agency has conducted a survey among 1,350 companies in 39 sectors and come up with findings that are music to the ears of the salaried class. It says that the average salary hikes may reach 9.4% this year compared to 8.8% in the previous year. Pay hikes for FY21 have been confined to only a few sectors such as information technology and e-commerce. The 9.4% figure would mark a return to the pre-pandemic level of 9.3% recorded in FY19.

Employees of India Inc certainly deserve every rupee of pay hike that might come their way for FY22. First, many companies have recorded a leap in bottom lines during the pandemic — a number of them slashing both fixed and variable costs in an unprecedented manner. Second, their employees have beaten several odds to help the companies achieve fortune in these trying times. Third, the employees have suffered immensely during the period sandwiched between pay cuts and very high inflation levels. In many families, members have lost jobs squeezing the finances hard.

A few sectors such as information technology, e-commerce, and professional services are likely to witness the highest increments of more than 10%. Sectors such as cement, oil and gas, coal, power, engineering design might record the lowest rate at 7.8%. Almost 62% of the companies have said that they expect business to rise this year compared to 45.4% last year. Those apprehending a slide in business this year went down from 31.7% last year to 11.5%. Companies should open their purse strings to take care of the employees who helped them to make hay in times of misery.