The Ministry of Home Affairs is drafting a new Decree on the new minimum wage, expected to be applied from January 1, 2026, with an increase of 250,000 - 350,000 VND/month, equivalent to an average of 7.2%.
Notably, this draft stipulates that employers, after increasing the regional minimum wage, must not abolish or cut other salary regimes for employees, especially overtime pay, night work and benefits.
This is a very necessary regulation to have a basis to protect the legitimate and legal rights and interests of workers, as well as to increase the regional minimum wage as a real increase, bringing real benefits to workers.
In reality, each enterprise, especially FDI enterprises in industrial parks, will often have a part hired to manage finances.
This department will often be given a full package of a "piece of cake", for example 1 billion VND/year to pay salaries, bonuses to employees and other expenses. And whether the regional minimum wage or not increases, business owners only spend a fixed amount of 1 billion VND.
This means that in order to have more money to pay workers, the finance department is forced to cut many other expenses to avoid "abusing spending" in "those cakes".
Of course, no business is so insensitive that it cuts expenses related to overtime pay and night work. Because doing so is a violation of the law and will lead to collective reactions from workers as well as the participation and handling of the authorities.
To avoid violating the law, business owners will cut down on benefits, each thing a little to avoid causing disruption and strong reactions, for example, holiday bonuses, year-end allowances, shift allowances, gasoline, etc.
Therefore, in parallel with the specific regulations in the Decree regulating the minimum wage for employees working under labor contracts and other legal documents, it is the supervision, participation and demonstration of the bravery of trade union organizations at all levels, especially grassroots trade union officials to protect the rights of employees.
Simply put, when a business owner wants to "motivate" or change any previously agreed benefits of employees, there must be the opinion and consensus of the grassroots Trade Union.
Increasing regional minimum wages is only really meaningful, creating motivation for workers when overtime wages, night allowances and other welfare regimes must be kept unchanged or added on the basis of the new minimum wage.
Increasing the minimum wage, if accompanied by protecting welfare, will become a strong motivation for workers to feel secure in their commitments, while businesses keep stable human resources.
