Economy

The budget allocated nearly 65 billion hryvnias to raise educators’ salaries, but people have hardly noticed it—Gryshina explained why

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The government has allocated a record amount for the education system—64.6 billion hryvnias—to raise teachers’ salaries, but a significant portion of educators have not actually seen this increase because the Ministry of Education and Science has yet to draft a new bill to reform the compensation system. Yulia Grishina, a member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Education, Science, and Innovation and a People’s Deputy of Ukraine, spoke about this in an interview with the YouTube channel "Komersant Ukrainian".

According to her, educators’ base salaries increased by 30% on January 1 and by another 20% on September 1, however, the current pay system—based on a small base salary and numerous allowances—neuts the effect of the raise.

“What is an educator’s salary? It’s a small base salary and a huge number of allowances. 50% on top of the base salary—it sounds impressive, but in reality, people don’t receive that much because the base salary is so low.

And when some local authorities began canceling the allowances, teachers didn’t feel any pay raise at all,” the MP emphasized, adding that she personally received assurances from the newly appointed head of government, Serhiy Koretskyi, regarding the continuation of the policy to raise educators’ salaries.

As a reminder, the 2026 state budget provides for a significant increase in teachers’ salaries—30% effective January 1 and 20% effective September 1.

A record 64.6 billion hryvnias has been allocated in the state budget for these salary increases. Prior to the first reading of the draft budget, the Cabinet of Ministers had proposed allocating 53.8 billion hryvnias for this purpose, but during the finalization of the document, the funding was increased to 59.8 billion hryvnias, and following final consultations, parliament additionally approved the allocation of another 4.8 billion hryvnias.

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The budget allocated nearly 65 billion hryvnias to raise educators’ salaries, but people have hardly noticed it—Gryshina explained why