Guangdong would raise its minimum wage by an average 18.6 percent from March, domestic media said Thursday, in a sign that Chinese labor costs may rise strongly again this year.
The wage rise would lift minimum salaries in Guangdong, China s export hub, by between 140 yuan (US$21.27) and 200 yuan, the China Business News said.
The pay rise would also give Guangdong s provincial capital city Guangzhou the highest minimum salary in China, of 1,300 yuan a month, the newspaper said.
Shenzhen, which raised the minimum wage in the city by 10 percent to 1,100 yuan per month in July last year, would decide its own minimum wage, the report said.
After a decade of steady rises in minimum salaries across Chinese cities and provinces, wage increases accelerated last year as China s economic boom spread into the hinterland and fueled competition for labor.
Beijing, for instance, lifted the floor for wages by 200 yuan to 1,160 yuan a month from Jan. 1, following a 20 percent increase just six months earlier.
The government has repeatedly pledged to increase workers share of national income as part of efforts to boost consumption.
Rising wages put pressure on China s inflation, already running at its highest in more than two years, but that is compensated by even faster gains in productivity.