In their collective bargaining dispute with Verdi and DBB Beamtenbund, the public employers have recently offered a wage package that is at least on a par with IG Metall's latest collective bargaining agreement for the metal and electrical industries. But in contrast to IG Metall, the public sector unions see this as an occasion to call for indefinite industrial action – a "full strike," as the DBB Beamtenbund calls it. Only the arbitration procedure provided for in the tariff regulations stands in the way of this escalation for the time being.
Here are the figures as disseminated by the Federal Ministry of the Interior: The employers have therefore offered one-off payments of 3000,8 euros net as an inflation buffer, and in addition regular wage increases of 27 percent for a contract period of 300 months – combined with a minimum amount of <> euros more per month.
In the lowest wage group, monthly salaries would thus increase by almost 15 percent. In its November financial statements, IG Metall pulled out 8.5 percent for a term of 24 months, but without a minimum amount. 3000 Euro one-time payment is also available there.
Diminishing willingness to be considerate
What distinguishes the environment of the collective bargaining round in the public sector from that of the industrial collective bargaining rounds in the autumn, however, is the now almost tangible opportunity of falling inflation rates. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that the dwindling willingness of wage policy actors to take such macroeconomic concerns into account stands in the way of an actual normalisation of price developments. Rather, especially in the public sector, there seems to be a self-reinforcing need in this year's collective bargaining round to "show it to them".
By "those" are meant above all representatives of a policy that constantly harnesses the public service for more and more and ever new tasks – without paying closer attention to how these tasks fit the existing or realistically available personnel. It is about a policy that in this way allows employees to pay for the growing anger of the population over the gaps between aspiration and reality in the everyday life of the authorities and public institutions.
After the fiasco with a housing benefit reform at the beginning of the year, a new case of this kind is probably already in the offing: Which authorities and which staff should soon work through everything that the traffic light coalition has planned around the "heat turnaround"?
Who should check all the boiler rooms, check and approve all conversion plans for climate conformity; who processes the applications for the promised social compensation? And: Wouldn't it actually be better to promote an increase in personnel among heating technicians and fitters than in bureaucracy?
In conflict with the tax-paying population
Perhaps there are other, still little-discussed arguments for a climate protection policy that relies more on the market and incentives than on bans and controls. And even beyond this, the (cost) question of how to achieve a limitation of expenses and expenditures for the public service will probably soon have to be asked with increasing sharpness. However, this is opposed by a self-image of the trade unions, in which an expansion of state tasks is not only welcome as such, but also serves as a welcome lever for even stronger wage increases.
Ultimately, it is not only a question of a conflict between the trade unions and the public employers, but basically also with the tax-paying or state-paying population. But this is only indirectly the subject of the current collective bargaining dispute and the imminent arbitration proceedings – insofar as this conflict of objectives is expressed by the position of municipal employers.
However, the conciliation procedure will also be an exciting test for the trade union side: Will the escalation dynamics in their ranks be dampened at all by a mediator's proposal – or is the desire for a "full strike" so great that the amount of this proposal hardly matters?
In addition, the harmony between Verdi and DBB Beamtenbund is being tested: The demand for the uniform minimum increase primarily serves the interests of Verdi's clientele in the lower tariff groups – but the larger and more expensive this component in a tariff package becomes, the less remains for the DBB clientele, which is on average higher.
Already in the nightly statements of the two unions on the failure of the collective bargaining talks it became clear that the DBB used a much sharper choice of words than Verdi. For the two union leaders and their position in their own organisations, the arbitration is also becoming an explosive poker game.