{"id":7917,"date":"2025-10-04T09:32:38","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T03:02:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/moemaka.net\/eng\/?p=7917"},"modified":"2025-10-04T09:32:42","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T03:02:42","slug":"pay-top-ups-for-civil-servants-and-pensioners-raised-by-30000-kyat-while-the-public-faces-unprecedented-prices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/moemaka.net\/eng\/2025\/10\/pay-top-ups-for-civil-servants-and-pensioners-raised-by-30000-kyat-while-the-public-faces-unprecedented-prices\/","title":{"rendered":"Pay top-ups for civil servants and pensioners raised by 30,000 kyat, while the public faces unprecedented prices"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"\"<\/a><\/h1>\n

Myanmar Spring Chronicle \u2013 Viewpoint for October 2<\/h1>\n

(MoeMaKa) October 3, 2025<\/p>\n

Pay top-ups for civil servants and pensioners raised by 30,000 kyat, while the public faces unprecedented prices<\/h2>\n

The military regime announced on September 30 that it would grant civil servants and pensioners an additional allowance of 30,000 kyat per month<\/strong>. This is the third<\/strong> such \u201cadditional support payment\u201d since the coup: once in October 2023<\/strong>, once in August 2024<\/strong>, and now again in October 2025<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Instead of legally revising base salary scales, the junta has relied on these \u201ctop-up\u201d allowances. One might argue it is because, without a parliament, the junta cannot carry out a formal pay-raise process as an elected government would.<\/p>\n

Because this is framed as a special allowance, it does not<\/strong> raise the statutory minimum wage<\/strong> for workers in the private sector such as day laborers and factory workers, leaving them excluded and disadvantaged. In garment and other private factories, the minimum daily wage<\/strong> remains 4,800 kyat<\/strong>, and\u2014because the junta has twice added 1,000-kyat \u201callowances\u201d\u2014some calculate an effective daily floor of 6,800 kyat<\/strong>, though this often doesn\u2019t factor into base-pay calculations. With the latest 30,000-kyat top-up for government staff and pensioners, people are watching to see whether private-sector daily wages will be increased by another 1,000 kyat.<\/p>\n

Since the February 1, 2021<\/strong> coup, political, military, and diplomatic turmoil has driven the kyat\u2019s depreciation<\/strong> against the U.S. dollar by roughly 300%<\/strong>. From around 1,300 kyat per USD<\/strong> at the time of the coup, the rate climbed to about 4,000 kyat<\/strong>, and at times even 5,000\u20136,000 kyat<\/strong> per dollar.<\/p>\n

More recently, the kyat has strengthened<\/strong>, which many attribute primarily to Thai\u2013Myanmar border trade restrictions<\/strong>. Beginning in August, imports via the Myawaddy\u2013Mae Sot<\/strong> crossing were abruptly halted and even goods already inside Myanmar were seized, sharply reducing demand for foreign currency to pay for Thai goods and thus lifting the kyat.<\/p>\n

These restrictions were likely intended to cut tax revenues<\/strong> for armed resistance groups along border trade routes while also reducing foreign-currency demand and propping up the kyat\u2014\u201ckilling two birds with one stone.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, despite a stronger kyat, the prices of daily necessities, consumer goods, and services<\/strong> have not fallen<\/strong>; many have risen further<\/strong>. The kyat\u2019s rise is not due to sound macroeconomic policy or higher domestic production; rather, it is the result of blocking imports<\/strong> of consumer and industrial inputs, which reduces FX demand but also creates shortages<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

For ordinary people, medicines, foodstuffs, and consumer items have become scarcer and costlier<\/strong>. Even in Yangon\u2019s City Mart and its Market Place branches that sell imported goods, shelves are thin and prices unprecedented. Detergent, toothpaste, cooking oil, and medicines have become extremely expensive<\/strong>. Service fees and labor costs are high while goods are scarce; most people are living through a wartime, blockade-like economy. Transport between cities and travel costs have reached levels never seen before<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

If this is the situation in big cities like Yangon<\/strong> and Mandalay<\/strong>, conditions are far worse<\/strong> in active conflict areas. People there face soaring medical expenses; many can no longer access services locally and must travel across regions or states for treatment, paying hundreds of thousands of kyat<\/strong> just for transport. In some places a single hospital visit means 400\u2013500 thousand kyat<\/strong> in travel costs alone.<\/p>\n

Viewed in this context, the junta\u2019s 30,000-kyat<\/strong> top-up will be quickly swallowed<\/strong> by the surging cost of living. Burdened with the costs of war, the public is struggling to stay afloat\u2014neck-deep<\/strong> in a sea of prices they have never faced before.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Myanmar Spring Chronicle \u2013 Viewpoint for October 2 (MoeMaKa) October 3, 2025 Pay top-ups for civil servants and pensioners raised by 30,000 kyat, while the public faces unprecedented prices The military regime announced on September 30 that it would grant…<\/p>\n

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