Workers in Beijing should expect a salary increase of 16 percent at the highest and 4 percent at the lowest after the local government released its suggestive guidelines for average wage increase this year at 12 percent.

According to the Bureau of Social Security and Human Resources, Beijing was able to submit its suggestive average salary guideline on schedule, making it one of the 10 regions (provincial level) that have made public the guideline this week.

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The suggestive guideline for average salary, however, is not compulsory, analysts said, which means companies will not be compelled to enforce the salary raise.

However, some regional governments in China have made forceful measures to ensure that the suggested increase is implemented by enterprises.

Based on the guidelines published by 10 provincial level regions, salary increase in China this year will be lower than the raise implemented last year, a sign that the country's economy continues to face headwinds.

"The drop in average guidelines indicates that China's economic growth remains slow," said Zhang Chewei of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Among the regions, Henan province and Xinjiang Uygur have suggested the highest increase at 15 percent, but experts doubt if companies will have enough capabilities to implement such a huge salary hike.

Experts said the suggestive guidelines have never been a measure of the actual salary increase for workers in China. In the past, wage hikes did not actually reflect the suggestions by the local governments.

Zhang and other Chinese experts urged the government to implement tax reductions on enterprises to ease their burden and pressure, raise their profits, and thus give them the ability to increase wages.

"We need to have a healthy mechanism to achieve win-win solution for both the employees and the enterprises in the long run," Zhang said.

TagsBeijing Wage, Beijing Wage Increase, Beijing Salary Increase, China Wage Increase, China Salary Increase