Many factors affect household income
In Thanh Son commune, Phu Tho province, Ms. Bui Viet Ha, a retiree, said that the current pension level is only enough to cover essential monthly expenses.
“Every month I receive more than 3 million VND in pension. Previously, it was still temporarily enough for basic expenses, but now food, electricity, water, and medicine prices have all increased. If pensions are adjusted to increase, although not much, elderly people in the countryside like us are also less stressed,” Ms. Ha shared.
According to Ms. Ha, many elderly people in the locality have no other sources of income other than pensions or social allowances. Therefore, adjusting pensions according to price fluctuations is very necessary to ensure the minimum living standards for this group.
Meanwhile, Mr. Le Van Tuan, an official in a locality in Cam Khe commune, Phu Tho province, said that the current income level of many grassroots officials is still quite modest compared to living expenses.
My income is about more than 7 million VND per month. With this level, if living in the countryside, I can still manage, but when food prices, medical services, and education for children all increase, it is quite stressful," Mr. Tuan shared.
Information from the Statistics Office under the Ministry of Finance, the survey results on the living situation of households in January 2026 show that the group of households with reduced income, mainly due to the decrease in salaries and wages of family members, accounted for 46.6%.
About 29.7% of households said that income decreased due to reduced revenue from agriculture, forestry and fisheries.
In addition, about 32.7% of households believe that revenue from non-agricultural production, business and service activities decreased compared to before.
Many other factors also affect the income of households. About 23.8% of households said that increased input costs for production and business activities caused profits to decrease. About 22.1% of households assessed that selling prices of products from production and business activities decreased. 21.4% of households said that the scale of family production and business decreased, while 19.2% of households said that some members had to temporarily quit their jobs.
Notably, in the first month of 2026, up to 31.3% of households said they were negatively affected by rising prices of goods and services.
Wishing the salary policy to continue to be adjusted
Data from the Statistics Office under the Ministry of Finance shows that the average income of workers in 2025 reached about 8.4 million VND per month, an increase of 8.9% compared to the previous year.
However, the income gap between labor groups is still quite large. The average income of male workers reaches about 9.5 million VND per month, while female workers reach about 7.2 million VND per month.
The difference is also clearly shown between urban and rural areas. The average income of workers in urban areas is about 10.1 million VND per month, while in rural areas it is only about 7.3 million VND per month.
In the context of increasing living costs, many workers want the wage policy to continue to be adjusted in the direction of improving actual income.
In order to meet this requirement, the Prime Minister has issued Decision 282 on the State Administrative Reform Plan for the period 2026 - 2030. One of the key contents of the plan is to develop policies to reform salaries, bonuses and diversify preferential treatment regimes for cadres, civil servants, and public employees right in 2026.
Previously, Official Dispatch No. 38 of the Prime Minister also assigned the task of adjusting the base salary, pension and various allowances in the coming time to contribute to improving the lives of workers and policy beneficiaries.
According to many experts, salary reform not only increases income for workers but also promotes productivity and economic growth.
