Hourly wages in France rose by 2.5% in the first quarter of 2025, compared to the corresponding period last year, new data from Insee has found.
According to the Insee data, on a quarter-on-quarter basis, wages were steady (+0.1%) in the quarter, compared to Q4 2024, which is a deceleration from the 1.3% increase recorded in that quarter.
This slowdown is largely attributed to a drop in payments of the Value Sharing Premium (PPV), which fell from €1.8 billion in Q4 2024 to €520 million in Q1 2025.
Annual wage growth stood at a high point of 5.1% in mid 2023, with the current year-on-year increase reflecting a cooling of inflation pressures, with consumer prices rising by just 0.9% year-on-year in Q1 2025.
On a sector-by-sector basis, wages in industry increased by 2.8% in the first quarter of the year, slightly up from 2.7% in Q4. Services saw a 2.5% annual increase, consistent with the prior quarter, while construction saw a slowdown, from 2.7% to 2.3%.
Hourly labour costs
Hourly labour costs demonstrated a similar trend to that of hourly wage costs during the period – on an annual basis, labour costs were up 2.7%, down slightly from the 2.9% recorded in the previous quarter, while on a quarter-on-quarter basis, they rose 0.5%.
‘The rise in labour costs over a year remained slightly higher than the rise in wages: this primarily reflected the decline in the amounts of exemptions of employers′ contributions, which had sharply increased between the end of 2021 and the end of 2023, and to a lesser extent the legislative changes introduced at the start of 2025, like the reduction in the amount of apprenticeship aid,’ Insee noted.
In construction, the annual increase in labour costs stood at 2.5% (down from 3.1%); in industry, it was 2.9% (from 3.1%); while in services, it stood at 2.6% (from 2.8%).
Sectors such as financial and insurance activities and real estate saw sharper increases, with labour costs rising 4.8% and 4.2% year-on-year, respectively. Read more here.
