From 1 July 2026, Paraguay's general minimum wage for unspecified private-sector activities is Gs. 3,044,000 per month. The corresponding minimum for a jornalero is Gs. 117,077 per day. Those are the headline numbers created by the 2026 adjustment, but neither is a universal shortcut for every contract.
Decree 6225 set the adjustment and the Ministry of Labour's Resolution 670/2026 publishes the operational table. The increase was 5%. The same table contains separate references for monthly workers, day labourers, hourly work, night work, part-time contracts and activities with differentiated scales.
Start with the employment form, not the division
For general daytime work, the official 2026 table lists:
| General scale from July 2026 | Official amount |
|---|---|
| Monthly minimum | Gs. 3,044,000 |
| Day wage for a jornalero | Gs. 117,077 |
| Daily reference for a monthly-paid worker | Gs. 101,467 |
| Hourly reference for a monthly-paid worker | Gs. 12,683 |
Those figures are related, but they are not invitations to choose whichever calculation produces the lowest payroll. The legal form of the employment and the actual schedule determine which line is relevant.
A useful example is the daily reference for a monthly worker. Multiplying the rounded hourly figure by eight gives Gs. 101,464, while the official table publishes Gs. 101,467. The official table wins. Payroll should not create its own alternative minimum by repeatedly rounding derived values.
Night work is a different floor
The Labour Code applies a 30% premium to a full night schedule. For the general 2026 scale, the official monthly minimum for night work is Gs. 3,957,200.
Mixed schedules need to separate the hours that legally count as night work from daytime hours. A monthly salary does not convert night hours into ordinary hours. The worker's schedule therefore belongs in the wage calculation, not just in an attendance sheet.
Part-time is not simply half the monthly minimum
The 2026 table gives a specific hourly floor for part-time work: Gs. 14,635 for a daytime hour and Gs. 21,743 for a night hour.
A four-hour daytime part-time shift at the published floor therefore represents Gs. 58,540 for those four hours. Four night hours at the published night part-time value represent Gs. 86,972. These are simple illustrations of the published hourly floors, not complete payslips; the legal contract, weekly schedule and any other wage components still matter.
The important point is that an employer should not take the full-time monthly minimum, divide it informally by two and call the result a compliant part-time salary. Paraguay has a specific part-time regime and published hourly values.
Gross minimum and take-home pay are different questions
The statutory minimum is a labour-law floor for remuneration, not necessarily the final amount deposited after lawful employee deductions. In the general IPS regime, the employee contribution is withheld from remuneration and the employer has a separate contribution of its own.
A payslip should therefore let the worker reconstruct the calculation: gross salary, premiums or commissions, lawful deductions and net payment. The employer's own social-security cost cannot be used as a reason to push the worker's gross wage below the applicable legal minimum.
Aguinaldo is also separate. It is calculated from remunerations earned during the year; it is not permission to spread the ordinary minimum across thirteen nominal payments.
The headline scale does not cover every occupation
Resolution 670/2026 contains differentiated scales for specified activities and professional grades. Before applying Gs. 3,044,000, check whether the occupation appears in the annex under another value.
Domestic workers are entitled to the general minimum for the applicable full schedule. Apprenticeships have their own regime. Public-sector remuneration follows different legal and budgetary structures.
The safest payroll rule is therefore: identify the activity and legal category first, then the schedule, then the current table.
Why the minimum wage is a poor proxy for the typical wage
The minimum is a legal floor, not the national average salary. Paraguay's large informal labour market is the reason the distinction matters so much.
INE reported that 55% of non-agricultural salaried workers in its 2025 comparison were informally employed. Among salaried workers earning less than one minimum wage, 79.8% were informal. Those figures do not legalise underpayment; they show why observed household income and the statutory wage can diverge sharply.
For cost-of-living comparisons, using the minimum wage as if it described the ordinary formal salary can therefore mislead in both directions.
A six-point check for an offer or payslip
Verify the legal employer and occupation; whether the worker is monthly-paid, daily-paid or part-time; the daytime and night schedule; the gross wage and each variable component; IPS registration and deductions; and overtime, payday and aguinaldo treatment.
The Labour Code sets ordinary maximums of eight hours a day or 48 a week for daytime work and seven hours a day or 42 a week for night work, subject to its special cases. A salary equal to the monthly minimum does not purchase unlimited hours.
For disputes or a current calculation, use the latest MTESS table rather than an old article or screenshot. The number changes; the method does not: category, schedule and date have to be correct before the headline minimum means anything.