As Germany’s biggest union, IG Metall, begins discussions on demands for a wage increase of up to 8.2 per cent for the country’s 85,000 steelworkers in the coming weeks, Birgit Dietze expects reverberations for workers across Europe.
“When companies are making high profits, as they are at the moment, there can and must be compensation for the sharp rise in prices for employees,” Dietze, IG Metall’s chief negotiator in the east German steel industry, told the Financial Times ahead of a vote by the union’s board on Sunday, when members backed the proposed rise.