Salary: from Latin salarium which meant the payment to the soldier for the year of military service.
Salary: from Latin soldiers, which meant the piece of currency with which it was paid.
There are many meanings of the term salary, which is nothing more than the consideration that a worker receives in exchange for his services, however, it is important to keep in mind that there is a constitutional definition of such a concept, which is necessary to know and use.
Article 1 of Convention 95 of the International Labor Organization -ILO-, duly ratified by Guatemala, and being an International Convention on Human Rights, establishes:
“For the purposes of this Agreement, the term salary means remuneration or earnings, however named or method of calculation, as long as it can be assessed in cash, fixed by agreement or by national legislation, and due by an employer to a worker by virtue of an employment contract, written or verbal, for the work that the latter has carried out or must carry out or for services that he has rendered or must render”.
The fact that it refers to remuneration that can be assessed in cash should be analyzed in particular detail. This implies that any remuneration in kind that is not effective, but that can be determined in cash, is also part of the salary.
A second important dimension is the fact that it may be due to work that has been done in the past or should be done in the future, which can be interpreted as referring to the fact that if the work is not completed due to imputation outside the worker , the salary must be computed in the same way.
The legal definition is still very general, and its concept requires it, since the salary must include any remuneration of any kind that the worker receives, under the principle that the employer gives him a remuneration in exchange for providing his services. personal services, not as a gift, not as a thank you, but as an obligation per se.
Due to its calculation method, it is divided into:
- Per unit of time: it is usually the most common form of calculation, and it refers to the fact that the salary can be paid monthly, fortnightly, weekly, per day or even per hour. It is established that compliance with the working day will be sufficient to create the obligation to pay the established salary.
- By work unit: There is the possibility of agreeing on the salary per piece, task, lump sum or piece rate. This form of calculation is usually used by employers with their workers who are dedicated to sales, imposing a minimum wage, plus additional compensation depending on the number of sales they make. Although it is also common in clothing, food production or construction.
- By participation in profits, sales or collections: it is a form of calculation that is currently in disuse or at least, little used. It consists of calculating the salary proportionally or as a percentage of the employer's commercial success, however, at no time can losses be part of the salary, nor can the workers assume the commercial risk.
The most important thing in relation to salary is that the legal amount of salary is the one used to calculate labor benefits, or compensation for unjustified dismissal. For this reason, it is important to take into account that the legal salary is the average economic amount that the worker has received during the last six months of the legal labor relationship.
It should be understood that the salary that is commonly known as the base salary is not for any reason the amount on which the benefits must be calculated, since all the remuneration that the worker must be considered as salary (according to the constitutional definition). perceive.
Finally, it should be mentioned that commissions, bonuses, increases, or any other remuneration that can be calculated in money, will be part of the salary, and must be taken into account for the calculation of any labor benefit.
Credit: Lic. Miguel Juarez
