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Window cleaners are among the low earners (archive image)
Photo: Wolfgang Kumm / picture alliance / dpa
For the first time, salaries in the low-wage sector rose more sharply than those of high-income earners.
The Federal Statistical Office announced on Monday that there was for the first time a trend towards wage equalization between low and high earners in 2018.
Higher earners achieved 3.27 times the gross hourly earnings of low earners, while in 2014 it was 3.48 times.
"The wage gap is closing particularly clearly in East Germany," it said.
Here, higher earners achieved 2.80 times higher gross hourly earnings than low earners in 2018.
In 2014 it was 3.31 times as much.
This trend was significantly weaker in western Germany (3.47 in 2014 and 3.29 in 2018).
The Federal Statistical Office had already announced a stop in the so-called wage spread in 2014.
However, this does not reduce the absolute wage gap in Germany.
Because of the lower starting value, the average hourly wage in the low-wage sector rose by 1.37 euros, while it rose by 2.74 euros for the higher earners.
Low-wage earners benefit from the minimum wage
An equalization of the earnings gap between East and West Germany can be seen especially among the low-wage earners, who make up the bottom ten percent of the wage scale.
One reason for this is likely to be the nationwide statutory minimum wage introduced on January 1, 2015.
In 2018 it was 8.84 euros, currently it is 9.35 euros.
In contrast, with higher earners - the top ten percent of the wage scale - the salaries between East and West did not converge any further.
A good fifth of those employed in the low-wage sector
Overall, a good fifth of the jobs in Germany in 2018 were in the low-wage sector.
At 29.1 percent, the proportion in eastern Germany is still significantly higher than in the west (including Berlin) with 20.0 percent.
While the share in the east fell by 5.4 points in 2018 compared to 2014, it rose slightly by 0.7 percentage points in west Germany.
The proportion of jobs in the high-wage sector fell slightly in both East and West Germany.
Most recently it was almost twice as high in the west at 22.3 percent as in the east at 11.2 percent.
The gross hourly earnings from which someone counts among the higher earners was EUR 31.76 in 2018, and that of low-wage earners was EUR 9.71.
The earnings structure is determined every four years.
It is based on a sample of 60,000 companies that provide information on the earnings and working hours of the employees.
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caw / AFP / Reuters