Collective bargaining: minimum wage rises probably to 8.80 euros – Tagesspiegel

02.27.2016 13:48 From Alfons Frese <- inTeaserPicPosition: 1 -> <- self.position: 1 -> <- classId: HCF-center -> <- position: center -> <- inIsPrint: false -> <- inHasPic: true ->

update The minimum wage rises 1 January 2017 is expected to only 8.80 euros. The unions wanted to achieve more.

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The legal minimum wage is next year is expected to rise only by 30 cents to 8.80 euros. As the Tagesspiegel of the Minimum Wage Commission members learned that wage increases in the past year and the anticipated wage settlements in the first half 2016, do not permit any larger increase. Nine or even ten euros were always times demanded by trade unionists. Based on the so-called tariff index, which is using the Federal Statistical Office calculated from more than 500 collective agreements, the minimum wage is expected to increase only by about 3.5 percent.

The next increase is 2019

the legal minimum wage of 8.50 euros was introduced by the grand coalition as of January 1, 2015. 1 January 2017, the law in front of the first increase. “Thereafter, the minimum Commission every two years to decide on adjustments of the minimum wage”, it said in the law. The next increase is so 2019. Until then, the workers have to – there are currently about 3.6 million, this country get the minimum wage – expected to settle for 8.80 euros. Unless the minimum Commission differs from the specification of the statistical rate index

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Until June, the Commission on the increase in 2017 to decide

that would be according to the law indeed possible. But the Commission itself has laid down in its Rules of Procedure, that this requires a two-thirds majority. And that is difficult to achieve in the composition of the Panel: Three representatives of employers’ organizations sitting against three unionists. There are also two non-voting researchers and the chairman. Until 30 June the Commission on the increase must decide early next year. For this purpose it is in addition to the collective agreements of the recent past and “the conditions of competition (in the labor market) and employment in relation to certain sectors and regions, as well as productivity,” have in mind, as stated in the law.

The economist Clemens Fuest believes to do just that when he advocates even for a lower minimum wage for the refugee problem, “One should at least freeze it, better even lower, because the situation has changed,” Fuest said the newspaper “Die Welt”.

argues quite different the union-owned research institute WSI, by referring to the collective index of the Federal Statistical Office, the 2014 and 2015 rose by 2.9 by 2.5 percent. That would be two years and the minimum wage is supposed to eventually “every two years (…) trailing on the evolution of tariffs” are adjusted, it is said in the law. Thus the WSI proposes the percentages of the two years to the 8.50 euros and comes to 8.97 euros. “This first nine euros would be set as an orientation mark.”

More than 8.85 Euro is not in it

The statement has a catch: in 2014 does not matter. Because in the first increase only the evolution of tariffs is taken from one and a half years, the minimum wage is estimated rises significantly lower, by about 3.5 percent. How much it will be in the end, decide especially the unions in the metal industry and in the public service. In April and May are here to wage settlements for together more than five million employees. If the unions are successful, the collective index rises accordingly and therefore goes high the minimum wage to 8.82 or 8.83 euros, also employers would probably not close to rounding up to 8.85 euros, according to the Commission. More is not in it.

In the volunteer panel sitting on the employer Bank Reinhard Göhner (Confederation of Employers’ Associations), Valerie Holsboer (Catering) and Karl-Sebastian Schulte (crafts). The unions are represented by Robert Craven (IG BAU), Stefan Körzell (DGB) and Michaela Rosenberger (Food, Beverages, Catering). As chairman acts of lawyer Jan Zilius, who worked for the IG BCE in the 1980s and then worked in the management of RWE. Is there a stalemate in the Commission Zilius has the casting vote.

At the next meeting in April, it’s all about a report in which the Commission evaluated the impact of the minimum wage. The study will cost taxpayers 800,000 euros for personnel, 200,000 euros for rooms and technical equipment and 100,000 for so-called information purposes. The effort has to be well, because it is about a lot.! Whether the minimum wage to pennies rises more or less, make a few hundred million from – for workers or for employers

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