Puerto Rico government employees and supporters have taken to the streets, emboldened by thousands of public school teachers who abandoned classrooms in early February to demand raises and better pensions. Protests have multiplied. Government workers are grappling with rising prices while getting the same salaries they had in 2008.
Legislators are the only public workers who have an automatic cost-of-living increase for their salaries. Most of the other public employees in Puerto Rico, which is a United States territory, have not gotten pay raises in more than a decade — sometimes two — as the cost of living has risen and the island has suffered a lengthy economic crisis and a government bankruptcy in the aftermath of deadly hurricanes, earthquakes and the coronavirus pandemic.
Power and water bills are nearly 60 percent higher in Puerto Rico than the US average. Groceries are 18 percent more expensive than on the mainland. Many public employees work one or two additional jobs to make ends meet.
‘They’re fed up’: Workers in Puerto Rico take to the streets | Workers' Rights News | Al Jazeera
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