The government cut school funding, froze wages, closed hospital beds, and laid off thousands of employees.

The agreement, retroactive to 1995, freezes wages for the first two years of the contract.

It freezes salaries and wages while allowing most prices to rise.

On Monday, the company signed a labor agreement with 2,000 workers that effectively froze wages through 1997.

But as employers freeze wages, they demand more experience.

What stirred the unusual opposition is that the agreement would freeze wages for the first two years.

He has also pledged to freeze wages, except in exchange for improved productivity.

It avoids layoffs but freezes wages over the next two years.

It's clear from speaking to businesses that a significant number are having to freeze wages in 2011.

Complicating the budget problems is the rejection of a teachers' contract that would have frozen wages for the next two years.