That's how big the spread is in public wages

Statistics Greenland has just published statistics showing the salaries of public sector employees in the self-government and municipalities.

The statistics show the average salary within the different professional groups.

At the very top is the trade union ASG (Akademikernes Sammenslutning i Grønland) with an average monthly salary of DKK 85,766.

At the other end of the scale is the salary for hourly-paid employees under the SIK collective agreement.

Here the average monthly salary is DKK 18,661. The salary of hourly-paid employees is further detailed in the statistics, where it appears that the basic salary is down to DKK 16,481. With supplements and overtime, the salary rises to DKK 18,661.

Social scientist: Contributes to the understanding of inequality

The statistics show that there is a large group of employees who are employed under the collective agreement.

A total of 3,539 annual leave days are taken by SIK hourly wage earners.

Social scientist and emeritus at Ilisimatusarfik, Birger Poppel, says about the figures for hourly wages that they contribute to the understanding of the general income inequality, which is greater in Greenland, for example measured by the Gini coefficient and also measured by some of the other inequality measures that Statistics Greenland uses:

- We have a group in the population, the hourly wage earners, who are typically unskilled, and who are probably also the group that has the most insecure conditions, says Birger Poppel.

The real earnings may be lower

He further says that the conditions for the individual may be worse than the statistics show:

- One must be aware that the calculations that have been made have been made in relation to full employment for one month.

- It is likely that there are some hourly workers who do not have full employment, and this means that the real earnings of some of the people we are talking about here will be even lower, says Birger Poppel and continues:

- It is clear that this affects their ability to shop and support themselves and contribute to the support of the family they are members of.

If you look at the average monthly salary for the other professional groups, it is a significant jump from the hourly-paid SIK members at DKK 18,661 to monthly-paid members of AK, which is DKK 34,547 (see table below).

Education and competition with Danish salaries

Birger Poppel sees the significant difference that, firstly, these are groups that have education.

Next, if you get to the academic level, salaries can also be affected by the fact that there is a greater degree of a joint Danish/Greenlandic labor market, which can affect salaries in an upward direction as a result of developments in Denmark.

- Unfortunately, we are not self-sufficient in, for example, academic labor, and then you have to attract some groups with Danish salaries. That is, in order to recruit, you have to be able to match the salary level that you have in Denmark to some extent. And that is not the situation in the unskilled hourly-paid area, says Birger Poppel.

Birger Poppel also points out that it may be a factor that in the hourly-paid area there are jobs that have had low prestige and have not been considered attractive.

The public sector has a great influence on the conditions

The researcher also points out that the Self-Government and the municipalities as employers and thus also collective agreement and contract negotiators have a decisive influence on both salary and other employment conditions.

In addition, Inatsisartut has a central influence on the living conditions of the lowest-paid through tax and levy policy.