Food prices in stores are constantly being corrected and rising. Citizens have no choice but to watch with anxiety the chain price increases of energy and basic foodstuffs, with incomes that can cover the ever-decreasing costs of living.
Food prices, especially basic life products, and energy prices are rising, and citizens are trying to find their way in a sea of rising prices. The Federation of Independent Trade Unions of BiH announced that the trade union consumer basket, which they calculated for December last year, amounted to 3114.95 KM. The average salary paid in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina for October 2024 was 1415 KM, while the minimum salary was then 619 KM. The coverage of the trade union consumer basket by the average wage was 45.43 percent, and the coverage by the minimum wage was 19.87 percent.
The high cost of living and the increasing need for additional income force many BiH citizens to work two jobs in order to make ends meet. As well as those who have finished their working life. The majority of BiH of citizens lives in poverty, either because of low wages or because of the excessively high cost of living. Ads by those looking for additional work are becoming more and more common.
“I’m looking for extra work in the afternoons and evenings in the form of caring for mobile elderly, looking after children, working in shops, stacking goods, cleaning or anything. Make an offer and I’ll be in touch”. “Greetings, I’m looking for an extra job for a few hours a week or on weekends. Offers please.” “I’m looking for additional work – cleaning apartments, babysitting” – these are just some of the ads published in recent days. Ensuring a life beyond basic needs is the reason for the decision of a Mostar resident in his forties to work two jobs.
– Both my wife and I work, even our salaries are not bad considering what they are, but we simply cannot cover all the expenses. Given that I have experience in the hospitality industry, I decided to take on an additional job. This allows us to cover expenses, but unfortunately, family and social life also suffer. Working two shifts for days does not leave room for socializing, but it also exhausts a person. I don’t know how much longer I can do this. Much of the social aspect of life is lost, relationships disappear. Whoever is young can work for a while, and I am not alone. Many work two jobs, and whoever has a family, who has children, must provide for the children, must find an additional job. If I manage to find a permanent job with a salary that enables a normal life, I will certainly not live and work like this again – this Mostar tells us.
No one knows how many there are who work two jobs, but, judging by the conversations, there are more and more of them.
Pensioners also work
Even those who have worked and contributed to the system for decades, some have not yet finished their working life. Many pensioners are forced to look for an additional source of income due to an insufficient pension. The right to be a regular employee and receive a pension is increasingly used by pensioners in BiH. This was the case, for example, only in the RS in 2013, when in that BH entity by the judgment of the Constitutional Court and enabled this right, the status of insured and pensioner at the same time had only 33 beneficiaries of the Institute for PIO of the RS.
Three years later, that number tripled, and in 2018 it rose to as many as 3,077. the entity had 5607 people, and at the end of last year that number was as high as 8053. Of the mentioned number, 93.5% (7530) of them are old-age pension beneficiaries, while the number of disability pension beneficiaries is significantly lower – 6.5% (523).
The number of pensioners who, in addition to receiving a pension, return to work is also increasing in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where this possibility was introduced a few years later than in the RS. According to data from the Federal Employment Agency, the number of employees in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina on December 31, 2022 who were over 66 years old was 2,991.
– I am retired, but I work for a company as a driver for several hours a day. The pensions are miserable, but, thank God, my health serves me, so I earn extra money so that my wife and I can survive – the pensioner from Mostar tells us.
It is a matter of necessity, not choice, is the opinion of experts.
– Today, in order to survive, it is necessary to do something else. Therefore, not only to work a regular job, but also to work an additional job on the weekend, or for pensioners to look for the possibility of working an additional job with their pension because it cannot cover the obligations arising from life’s needs – economist Zoran Pavlović told N1.
