Germany: wage agreement secured for 785,000 building and construction workers

As Wednesday 18 May dawned, and following long drawn-out negotiations, the German building and construction union, the IG BAU, announced that it had secured a wage agreement with the sector’s main employers’ federations, the ZDB and the HDB. The agreement will run for twenty-two months and intends for a two-stage wage rise as well as harmonization of wage levels across Länders from former East and West Germany. Western and eastern Länders will see wages go up by 2.4% and 2.9% respectively from 01 May 2016 and will receive a second stage raise of 2.2% and 2.4% respectively on 01 May 2017.
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4.6% for the west and 5.3% for the east. Three fruitless meetings and a final fourteen-hour talks marathon between the Zentralverband des Deutschen Baugewerbes – ZDB, the German Federation of building and construction businesses, the Hauptverband der Deutschen Bauindustrie – HDB, the German Building and Construction Employers’ Federation, and the IG BAU union were, according to the union, “particularly bitter”. “The result is a compromise that has been difficult for both parties to secure.” “Ne

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