National Situations: Germany

Traditionally a high-wage country, Germany has lately resorted to wage restraint and labour cost competition in order to defend its international competitiveness. As a result, restructuring, which was dramatic between about 1985 and 1995 with German unification in the middle of the period, seems to have recently slowed down before the financial and economic crisis of 2008 (...)

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Our publications about Germany

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Germany – Concession bargaining undermines the working conditions/wages of core workers

February 18, 2016

Chiara Benassi is the author of an ETUI Policy Brief focusing the IG Metall campaign for agency workers. Concession bargaining is often framed as a response to organisational or economic crises and therefore as a useful instrument for dealing with employment restructuring in the short term. This policy brief examines the practice of concession bargaining […]

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Germany – Debate on the Ruhr area restructuring: from black to green energy

October 15, 2015

An ETUI research for the ILO on the challenge of a restructuring process towards a resource and energy efficient sustainable economic model based on the Ruhr área (Germany)  will be discussed on the 12 November in Brussels. For further information please see: http://www.etui.org/Events/Monthly-Forum-The-long-and-winding-road-from-black-to-green-decades-of-structural-change-in-the-Ruhr-region

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Germany – Article on the German model underlines social security and partnership

September 17, 2015

Joachim Möller published an article in the Journal for Labour Market Research where he discusses the specific features of the German model as a specific variety of capitalism. The author considers that it builds more on social security and social partnership and that a certain erosion of the German model resulting from less collective bargaining […]

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Germany – German collective redundancies framework do not comply with European directive

July 23, 2015

  The European Court of Justice found that the German legislation did not comply with directive 98/59 of 20 July 1998 concerning collective redundancies. In fact, under German legislation, a director of the company and an intern were not included in the calculation of the number of workers, therefore, there was no collective redundancy. This […]

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Germany – Article shows that temporary agency workers are more vulnerable than in Belgium

May 14, 2015

Doerflinger and Pulignano published an article in Sage Open comparing Belgium and Germany on the relation between temporary agency workers and trade unions. One of the main conclusions is that these workers are more vulnerable in Germany. The article may be read here: http://sgo.sagepub.com/content/5/2/2158244015575633

Documents

► Texts and slideshows related to Restructuring in Germany : BAuA has published infromation on the issue of restructuring (in German)

► "Social Dialogue in Germany" (english version).

RENEWALS : Lessons learnt & Deliverables – December 2013

► KMU, Restrukturierungen, Innovationen und sozialer Dialog - policy paper 1, german version.

► Restrukturiegungen im öffentliche Dienst - Restrukturierungen, Innovationen und sozialer Dialog - policy paper 2, german version.