Documents Müller, Torsten 118 results

"As the first ever piece of EU legislation aimed explicitly at ensuring adequate minimum wages and promoting strong collective bargaining, the European Directive on Adequate Minimum Wages in the EU is a milestone in strengthening the social dimension of the European Union. Its ultimate policy objective is to reduce wage inequality and in-work poverty in order to advance upward social convergence and social cohesion across the EU. Because of the EU's limited competences on the issue of wages and collective bargaining, however, while the Directive is strong on procedural regulations it is weaker on substantive requirements, which are formulated mainly in terms of recommendations. This is why the real impact of the Directive in the sense of achieving its political objectives relies strongly on an ambitious transposition into national law that transforms the ‘soft law' of the Directive into hard law at national level.

One dimension of the analysis therefore concerns how the Member States have formally transposed the Directive into national law. However, the comprehensive formal transposition of the Directive is only one factor that will determine its success in realising its political objectives. The other important factor is the Directive's broader political implications as manifested in its influence on the political agenda and the political and public discourse about minimum wages and collective bargaining in the Member States. This report deals with both dimensions of the impact of the European Minimum Wage Directive."

"The 2022 Directive on Adequate Minimum Wages in the EU marks a milestone on the journey towards a more social Europe. With its two key objectives of ensuring adequate minimum wages and strengthening collective bargaining, the Directive aims to realize the broader policy goals of reducing in-work poverty and wage inequality. In order to achieve these objectives, the Directive sets out procedures and reference values concerning minimum wage setting and collective bargaining. Of particular importance are the reference values for the assessment of the adequacy of statutory minimum wages set out in Article 5.4 of the Directive – this is the so-called ‘double decency threshold' of 60% of the national gross median wage and 50% of the national gross average wage.

Furthermore, the Directive contains several important provisions which aim to support (sectoral) collective bargaining. First, Article 3.3 emphasises that collective bargaining is the prerogative of trade unions. This is important to prevent a competitive race to the bottom through agreements concluded by non-union organisations which may undermine adequate minimum wage protection. Second, Article 4 contains various provisions calling on the Member States to promote the bargaining parties' capacity to engage in collective bargaining at (cross-) sectoral level, as well as to protect the right to collective bargaining. This explicitly includes protection against discrimination against union representatives who (seek to) exercise this right. Finally, Article 9 underlines that, in accordance with EU Public Procurement Directives 2014/23/EU, 2014/24/EU and 2014/25/EU, Member States shall take appropriate measures to ensure that, in the awarding and performance of public procurement or concession contracts, economic operators and their subcontractors comply with the applicable obligations regarding wages, the right to organise and collective bargaining on wage-setting.

Article 4.2 of the Directive, furthermore, requires each Member State in which collective bargaining coverage is below 80% to establish an action plan to promote collective bargaining. The aim of this provision is to create a framework of enabling conditions in these countries with a view to progressively increase bargaining coverage. In its expert group report on transposition of the Minimum Wage Directive, the European Commission clarifies that this threshold ‘imposes an obligation of effort, not of result' and should therefore not be viewed as ‘a mandatory target to be reached'. Thus, even if this provision does not oblige Member States to achieve collective bargaining coverage of 80% in the strict legal sense, it de facto defines an EU-wide standard for collective bargaining coverage that Member States should aim for as a necessary condition of adequate minimum wage protection."

"Au cours des dernières années, les accords-cadres transnationaux (ACT) conclus aux niveaux international et européen sont devenus un nouvel outilde régulation au sein des entreprises transnationales. Proposant un exposé des origines et une présentation quantitative des ACT, ainsi qu'une analysedes stratégies menées par les fédérations syndicales internationales et européennes dans la négociation de ces accords, cet article se penche sur la questionde savoir si et comment ces nouveaux outils servent l'internationalisation des relations professionnelles. L'article aboutit à la conclusion que toutun éventail de conditions spécifi ques au secteur et à l'entreprise concernés doit exister pour permettre la signature d'un ACT. Lorsque ces conditionssont réunies, les ACT confèrent aux fédérations syndicales internationales et européennes, de même qu'aux comités d'entreprise européens, unrôle reconnu dans le domaine de la régulation sociale internationale. Dans certains cas, ils ont pu être utilisés avec succès pour résoudre des confl itslocaux. Les recherches conduites par les auteurs semblent indiquer que les ACT, s'ils sont employés de manière stratégique, sont susceptibles decontribuer au développement des relations professionnelles internationales au niveau de l'entreprise, voire de faciliter les activités d'organisation dessyndicats à long terme."

"This collection of four volumes charts the development of collective bargaining since the year 2000 in the 28 EU Member States.
These four volumes document how the institutions of collective bargaining have been removed, fundamentally altered or markedly narrowed in scope in all 28 EU Member States. However, there are also positive examples to be found. Some collective bargaining systems have proven more resilient than others in maintaining multi-employer bargaining arrangements. Based on the evidence presented in the country-focused chapters, the key policy issue addressed in this book is how the reduction of the importance of collective bargaining as a tool to jointly regulate the employment relationship can be reversed. The struggle to fend off the neoliberal assault on collective bargaining in Europe is moving towards an endgame. The outcome is still open."

"Policy recommendations:
The Directive on Adequate Minimum Wages obliges Member States of the European Union (EU) with collective bargaining coverage of below 80% to establish action plans to promote collective bargaining, with the aim of progressively increasing collective bargaining coverage. To achieve this objective the following aspects are to be considered when establishing the action plan:
– procedurally, ensure that Member States meet the Directive's obligation to actively involve trade unions and employers' associations in establishing action plans;
– as regards content, the measures included in action plans should seek to strengthen trade unions' and employer organisations' capacity to act, as well as to provide political and institutional support for sectoral bargaining;
– measures to strengthen unions should aim to provide them with the right of access to companies and to protect union representatives from discrimination by the employer;
– measures to strengthen employers' organisations should aim to encourage the establishment of sectoral organisations and to improve employers' readiness to engage in (sectoral) collective bargaining;
– political and institutional support for sectoral collective bargaining should address public procurement and industrial policy to ensure that public contracts and public financial support more generally are given only to companies that respect and apply the provisions of collective agreements;
– ambitious national action plans are important to compensate or to correct minimalistic transposition of the Directive in many Member States. This will require intensifying political and public pressure on the respective national governments through trade unions and all other progressive actors interested in ensuring adequate minimum wages through high collective bargaining coverage."