The capital government of Mexico City will need to standardize the salaries of prison guards with those of the capital police, after six years in which the Penitentiary System was integrated into the Secretariat of Citizen Security (SSC). The Vice President of the Human Rights Commission of the local Congress, Rebeca Peralta, pointed out that currently a prison custodian earns an average of 14 thousand pesos a month, while a preventive police officer receives at least 18 thousand pesos monthly, not including additional bonuses.
There is a 30 percent difference between the salaries of these two groups of workers, both belonging to the Secretariat of Citizen Security, raising questions about the message being transmitted regarding the value of their work and their well-being. Peralta emphasized that the current working conditions of prison guards do not reflect the difficulty and vital importance of their work in the Penitentiary System and in the security of Mexico City.
In comparison with states like Nuevo León or Jalisco, prison guards in Mexico City earn between 30 and 40 percent less, despite the fact that in these states the penitentiary systems differ in terms of the number of penitentiary centers and persons deprived of liberty. This wage disparity is considered unfair and dangerous by Peralta, who warns about the negative impact it may have on the morale of the workers, fostering hostile environments and potential cases of corruption.
In presenting a point of agreement in the Plenary of Congress, the legislator recalled the salary standardization achieved in 2017 for the custodians when she chaired the now-defunct Special Commission on Prisons in the Legislative Assembly. Rebeca Peralta expressed her confidence that the capital government will show a similar willingness this time to resolve this salary disparity between prison guards and capital police officers.
