IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/ecoind/v35y2014i1p95-113.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Wage effects of works councils and opening clauses: The German case

Author

Listed:
  • Peter Ellguth
  • Hans-Dieter Gerner
  • Jens Stegmaier

Abstract

German employment relations are characterized by a distinct dual system. First, working conditions and wages are determined by industry-level collective bargaining agreements. Second, on the establishment-level, the works council is responsible for employer–employee negotiations. However, since the mid-1980s, an increasing number of areas of regulation have been transferred from the industry- to the establishment-level using so-called opening clauses. The analysis in this article relies on rich German establishment data and reveals new insights into the institutional machinery of wage bargaining. While the existence of such clauses is related to higher wages, their application results in wage cuts of roughly the same size. The results also suggest that works councils, on average, are able to prevent the negative wage effects of opening clauses.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Ellguth & Hans-Dieter Gerner & Jens Stegmaier, 2014. "Wage effects of works councils and opening clauses: The German case," Economic and Industrial Democracy, Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden, vol. 35(1), pages 95-113, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:ecoind:v:35:y:2014:i:1:p:95-113
    DOI: 10.1177/0143831X12463171
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0143831X12463171
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0143831X12463171?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:ecoind:v:35:y:2014:i:1:p:95-113. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.ekhist.uu.se/english.htm .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.