Lobbyists
from the farming and newspaper sectors worked hard to win exceptions to
Germany's minimum wage, it has been revealed. But the employers'
representatives don't think it did them much good.
Workers in a field (Photo: imago/Ralph Lueger) |
Germany is
seven months into its new minimum wage, but not everyone is happy. The
government has now admitted that lobbyists from a number of different sectors
had urged it add exceptions to the new rule that no one in the country should
earn less than 8.50 euros ($9.40) an hour.
The
information, shown to DW on Thursday, emerged thanks to an official
parliamentary request by the German Left party. Particularly persistent were
representatives of the farmers' and newspaper publishers' associations, who met
government representatives a total of 15 times in the months leading up to the
law being passed in parliament.
The pressure
seems to have been effective - both the agriculture sectors and the newspaper
sectors won delays in implementing the minimum wage. Temporary farm-workers can
be paid below minimum wage unto the end of 2016, while newspaper deliverers can
be paid less until the end of 2017.
Nahles (right) had to defend the minimum wage against serious lobbying |
Success or
failure?
"The
economic lobbyists have made sure that entire sectors have been left behind by
the minimum wage," Left party parliamentarian Michael Schlecht said in an
emailed statement. "Particularly the lobbyists of the publishers' and the
farmers' associations clearly felt a lot more need to speak to the government
during the lawmaking process."
"The
result is well known," he added. "Hundreds of thousands of people did
not benefit from the introduction of the minimum wage at the start of the
year."
But the
German Farmers' Association (BDV) don't think they gained much advantage.
"We were invited to hearings, like every interest group, and we think it's
legitimate to describe what happens in practice, in business," BDV
spokesman Michael Lohse told DW.
The farmers
also argued that the minimum wage will have a real impact on their business
when it comes into full effect for temporary workers during the 2017 harvest.
"We
analyzed that and communicated it - we will have to lose some production
abroad," Lohse said. "In Romania and Bulgaria they have a minimum
wage of one or two euros. Go shopping with your eyes open one day - there's
half a kilogram of cherries for 7.50 euros from Brandenburg, and you have two
kids who like to eat cherries, and you decide if you want cherries for 7.50
euros, or you buy the ones from Bulgaria for 3.50 euros. Then of course the
retailer turns round and tells the farmer I can't buy your cherries anymore.
Then production goes abroad and it will cost jobs - that's all we said. And
that's legitimate."
More
bureaucracy
Another
complaint against the minimum wage was the amount of bureaucracy involved. At
the end of June, Labor Minister Andrea Nahles, who drove the new minimum wage
legislation, bowed to pressure and eased the regulations forcing employers in
certain sectors to record how many hours their lowest paid workers were
working.
Cherries are cheaper in Bulgaria |
Up until
then, the new minimum wage law stipulated that employers in the construction
and gastronomy sectors, and others considered to be particularly susceptible to
off-the-books work, had to document the number of hours logged by anyone
earning less that 2,958 euros a month. That cap has now been lowered to 2,000
euros a month.
But Lohse
was not happy with the whole new system. "If you have 100 or 200 people on
a field and one of them has to leave, you have to write that down," he
complained. "If they go home to have lunch, you have to document that - if
it rains, or there's a storm. There are special conditions during the harvest
time and these documentation obligations all take a heavy toll."
The
conservative sections of the government coalition - both Angela Merkel's
Christian Democratic Union and its Bavarian sister party the Christian Social
Union - have been pressing for corrections to the law.
But Nahles'
Social Democratic Party can also point to considerable successes - in May it
could announce that 3.7 million people in Germany had received a pay raise as a
result of the minimum wage, and that dependence on social benefits had
declined. Also, fears that the new law would lead to a sharp rise in
unemployment figures have so far proved untrue.
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