Prime Minister Vasile Tofan said he has fulfilled his promise to examine the issue of excessively high salaries in the public sector and is now presenting the preliminary findings of the review, along with the Government’s first proposed measures, TRIBUNA reports.

“After analyzing data covering nearly 40,000 employees, we found that more than 85% receive net monthly salaries below 20,000 lei, while 55.6% earn less than 10,000 lei. Nearly 9% receive between 20,000 and 30,000 lei, and 4.3% earn between 30,000 and 50,000 lei. Salaries exceeding 50,000 lei are paid to 1.1% of employees in public institutions.

Independent regulatory agencies, which account for just 2.5% of the workforce (1,005 employees), have salary levels more than twice as high as the rest of the public sector and four-and-a-half times higher than those of state-owned enterprises. The overall average net salary across these institutions is nearly 12,000 lei.”

According to the Prime Minister, 439 employees—or 1.1% of those included in the review—receive net salaries above 50,000 lei. Most of these cases are found in independent regulatory authorities, followed by self-financed public institutions, project implementation units, state-owned enterprises, and joint-stock companies.

“I promised to communicate openly. A high salary is not necessarily an abuse. There are highly specialized professions where the state must compete with the private sector, including IT, cybersecurity, aviation, and other critical fields. These professionals must be paid fairly to attract and retain talent in an efficient public administration.

At the same time, we cannot tolerate excesses where such payments are unjustified. The state system is complex. Addressing these issues requires government decisions, legislative amendments, and decisions by founding authorities. We cannot do it overnight, but we want to introduce several measures immediately,” he said.

The Prime Minister outlined the Government’s initial proposals:

1. Manually review the 100 highest salary packages in the public sector.
2. Suspend all additional payments, bonuses, and extra allowances for employees earning more than three times the national average salary (over 52,200 lei) while the review is underway.
3. Suspend all forms of financial assistance for higher-paid employees during the investigation, as such payments have been used to grant unjustified bonuses.
4. Temporarily halt the distribution of profits in state-owned companies and public institutions where this mechanism has been used to supplement remuneration.
5. Increase transparency by creating a publicly accessible online database showing salary levels by institution and position.
6. Require regular video reports from the heads of state-owned enterprises and public institutions, including detailed reporting on remuneration.

“Dear citizens, we understand how sensitive this issue is. This is only the first step toward bringing greater discipline to excessive public-sector salaries. We encourage you to submit proposals and suggestions on how these measures can be improved.

We will continue working on government decisions, legislative amendments, and other necessary actions to clean up this area.

We believe that we can build a fair state—one in which citizens trust those who govern them—only by first putting our own house in order. That is where we will focus our efforts in the days and weeks ahead,” the Prime Minister added.