Criticism by labor and professional associations has intensified over the proposed 20% increase in the salaries of government employees and retirees in next year’s budget bill. This level of increase is described as paltry and insulting, and the government is seeking to fund the budget by dipping into the pockets and livelihoods of the people.
In the 2026 budget, the main burden of financing has been shifted from the government to society, and the government effectively intends to compensate for its budget deficit by increasing pressure on the people, especially wage earners.
Teachers, Retirees, And Workers Hold Protest Rallies in Cities Across Iran
At a time when the increase in government employees’ salaries is projected at around 20%, while the country’s real inflation rate stands at about 50%, the outcome is clear: a sharp decline in purchasing power, weakened livelihoods, and the further impoverishment of a large segment of the 55 million people who, according to official reports, are living below the poverty line.
Iran’s Retirees Council, an advocacy body representing retirees, wrote in a statement on Thursday, December 25, titled “The 2026 Budget; A Budget Based on Rent-Seeking and Repression,” that “the current government, like previous governments, under the harsh living conditions of the people, has generously moved to increase the budgets of non-productive, non-service, repressive, ineffective institutions that are unrelated to people’s lives, the result of which is the further expansion of poverty and general deprivation.”
In part of its statement, the council described the outcome of the 2026 budget for the people and the wage-earning class—referred to in Iranian media as an “austerity and resistance budget”—as “the continuation of poverty and growing misery.”
The statement says: “While they have generously and significantly increased the budgets of military, security, judicial, religious-propaganda, and media organizations and institutions, all expert evidence shows that over past decades, the starting point of inflation in Iran when facing budget deficits has always been shocks to the prices of basic necessities of people’s lives, and the 2026 budget is no exception.”
The Retirees Council also criticized the government of Masoud Pezeshkian, the current president of Iran’s regime, for having “planned to finance the main source of its budget expenditures for next year largely through tax increases, devaluing wages and salaries, and reaching into the pockets and dining tables of the people.”
The minimum salary for retirees and pension recipients has been set at 14 million and 40 thousand tomans, equivalent to 140 million and 400 thousand rials (approximately 104 dollars), and the minimum salary for government employees at 15 million and 600 thousand tomans, equivalent to 156 million rials (approximately 116 dollars); figures that, under conditions of high inflation and sharp increases in living costs, are practically insufficient to meet minimum livelihood needs.”
The 2026 budget bill allocates astronomical funds to institutions that have no direct connection to the economy or people’s daily lives.
The financial situation of retirees is so catastrophic that some are now selling their assets and belongings to pay for medicine and medical treatment.
Earlier, on December 23, the Free Workers Union of Iran warned: “A horrific inflation and unimaginable poverty and misery are on the way for next year,” and called for “nationwide strikes and protests to put an end to the hell dominating the country.”
The Iranian Teachers’ Trade Association also criticized the government’s decision to raise employees’ and wage earners’ salaries by 20% in next year’s budget bill, stressing that this increase, “while the real inflation rate is far higher and several times this figure, constitutes an overtly unjust action and one that contradicts the regime’s own enacted laws.”
According to the government’s budget bill submitted to the parliament, total allocations for the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), the state-run radio and television organization, increased to 35 thousand and 500 billion tomans, equivalent to 355 trillion rials (approximately 263 million dollars). These allocations, after rising by more than 20%, reached 35 thousand and 500 billion tomans, while the budget of this propaganda organization of the Iranian regime in the current year was about 29 thousand billion tomans, equivalent to 290 trillion rials (approximately 215 million dollars).
Meanwhile, according to Tejarat News, a news website focused on economic issues, the next year’s budget for the Iranian regime’s cultural, propaganda, and terrorist institutions—such as the Seminary Services Center, the Supreme Council of Seminaries, Al-Mustafa International University, and the Khorasan Seminary Planning Council—has reached about 27 thousand billion tomans, equivalent to 270 trillion rials (approximately 200 million dollars).
A journalist wrote on the social media platform X that while over the past five years the salaries of employees and retirees have increased by only 144%, the budget of the Islamic Propagation Organization, a state-run religious propaganda body, has grown by 975%, meaning that the organization’s function is to organize regime marches and demonstrations.
By contrast, the government collects taxes from sectors that are transparent, traceable, and lack political bargaining power—namely wage earners and the middle class.
