The Polish labor market has disappointed again. Wages are losing momentum and employment is falling.

August statistics from the Polish labor market, similarly to June disappointed economists. Employment continues to decline, accompanied by falling annual dynamics of average wages in the corporate sector.

Average salary in large non-financial enterprises in August 2025 amounted to PLN 8,769.08 gross and was 7.1% higher than a year ago. Meanwhile, economists expected an 8.0% increase. So for the second month in a row we see a clear disappointment in the case of wage dynamics. This is also the lowest increase in the "average national” from February 2021.

A month earlier , the annual dynamics of the "national average" was quite unexpectedly slowed to 7.6%, which was the lowest result since February 2021. Let us recall that in June wages in the enterprise sector were growing at an average rate of 9.0% per year, which was due to increases in the mining industry . In August, the "national average" was 1.5% lower than in July.

Overall, however, the trend here is downward. Wage growth nominal has been slowing down for several months now, but it still remains relatively high by historical standards. However, economists say that the trend downward trend will be maintained and that in the long term wage dynamics will slow down in close to normal.

However, from month to month, data on salaries in can surprise the corporate sector. Before the June surprise we had up disappointment in the results for May . Another surprise occurred in April, when it was interrupted there has been a series of four consecutive months of weakening wage dynamics , which in March additionally brought the lowest growth in over four years .

It is worth comparing the increase in nominal wages with the increasing lower official CPI inflation, which fell to 2.9% in August. As a result, even slower nominal wage growth leads to solid growth wages in real terms. After taking into account CPI inflation in August 2025, the average wages in the enterprise sector were 4.08% higher in real terms than before year. In July it was 4.34% year-on-year, and in June 4.75%. Nearly 5 percent real wage growth was unsustainable in the long run.

Average salary in large non-financial companies is just one of the indicators regarding wages in the Polish economy. however, it includes data from, among others, public administration, education, care healthcare and micro-enterprises. This means that this statistic applies to less than 40 percent. working.

The situation is different with the median and decile distribution of earnings. covering the national economy sector, including the public sector and smaller companies. However, these data are published with a six-month delay. We know However, the median wage for January 2025 was PLN 6,882.80 gross, i.e. 5 022 PLN net . For illustration purposes, let's say that today's category - i.e. the average salary in the corporate sector - in January 2025 amounted to PLN 8,482.47 gross, which is 23.2 percent more.

The Tax Office reported that in August 2025, the average employment in in the enterprise sector amounted to 6,419.4 thousand full-time jobs. This means there were 12.4 thousand more lower than in July, when a decrease of 3.8 thousand full-time positions was recorded. Excluding January "jumps" in employment statistics (resulting from the annual change sample of surveyed enterprises), employment in the enterprise sector is decreasing almost continuously since the beginning of 2023. In turn, since the beginning of 2025, there has been a decrease a total of 34.3 thousand full-time positions.

Average employment fell year-on-year in August by 0.78% y/y. This regression was slightly This result turned out to be consistent with expectations of economists who expected a decline in employment by 0.8% rdr.

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