The traffic light coalition has agreed to increase the minimum wage to twelve euros per hour.
The first details are now clear, but on one key issue the agreement remains strangely unclear.
Berlin - It was one of the central promises with which the SPD contested the federal election campaign: the increase in the statutory minimum wage.
The project is now also part of the traffic light coalition agreement.
Minimum wage: central body disempowered?
Millions of employees should benefit from the regulation: “We will increase the statutory minimum wage in a one-off adjustment to twelve euros per hour.
Following this, the independent minimum wage commission will decide on any further increase steps. "
However, this formulation turns out to be imprecise.
In the coalition agreement there is no indication of when exactly the minimum wage will be increased.
Usually the minimum wage commission, a body made up of trade unionists, employers and academics, decides on an increase.
They revoke their recommendation, which is essentially based on previous wage developments, every two years.
The minimum wage will be raised to twelve euros per hour - but when?
Most recently, on June 30, 2020, the commission recommended an increase in the minimum wage in four steps by the end of 2022: from the current EUR 9.60 per hour to EUR 9.82 from January 2022. From July 2022, EUR 10.45 will apply.
The Commission's next recommendation for 2023 and 2024 is due in summer 2022.
Now the future federal government wants to raise the statutory minimum wage to twelve euros “in a one-off adjustment”, thereby overriding the minimum wage commission.
But when?
Is it waiting for the Commission to issue a new recommendation?
Then the twelve euros would only be available from January 2023. However, it is also possible that the traffic light coalition collects the jump to 10.45 euros from July 2022 and immediately increases it to twelve euros.
A significant increase in the minimum wage had also advocated Achim Truger from Merkur.de *.
Minimum wage: Scientists warn of tipping point in the labor market
But it is not just a question of when, but also of whether the political influence is not becoming too great.
Scientists fear that the monopoly of the Commission could crumble and that it will not be the social partners but rather the parties who will decide on the minimum wage in future.
"The twelve-euro fix is a turning point that could easily be followed by a political competition," warned Holger Bonin from the Institute for the Future of Work (IZA) to
Welt
.
In this context, the scientist spoke of a tipping point on the German labor market.
It makes sense for trade unions and employers to decide on wage adjustments, as they know the conditions in the corporations and companies.
The minimum wage could not be increased at will, because at some point a tipping point will be reached, "from which the work becomes so expensive that companies cut jobs," explained Bonin.
