WAGES INEQUALITY IN THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA IN A POST CRISIS PERIOD

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to show the distribution
of net wages in the Republic of Macedonia
and whether the great world economic crisis of
2008 has had an impact on the inequality in the
distribution of wages. In this paper it is analyzed
the level of inequality in the distribution
of wages in Macedonia in 2008 as a year when
the economic crisis started in the last quarter, in
2012 as the year in which GDP still has had a
negative rate of economic growth and in 2014,
when the economy maintained positive economic
growth. In the three selected years the analysis
is based on examination of the inequality in
the distribution of the paid net wages.
In the paper, the analysis of inequality in the
distribution of net wages is based on determining
the distribution of frequencies, constructing
the Lorenz curve and the Gini index
calculation. The results show that there is a
quite expressed inequality in the distribution
of net wages in Macedonia, whereas the estimated
Gini index is 27.98 in 2008, 26.76 in
2012 and 25.88 in 2014. Thus, it should be
kept in mind that the inequality in the distribution
of total income is higher and in the
analyzed period the Gini index is greater than
40. This points the fact that Macedonia has
the highest inequality in the distribution of income
compared to all EU member states and
candidate countries for EU membership.