Five employers' associations from the metal and electrical industries have presented a uniform tariff offer that provides for a wage increase of 1.3 percent from July 2028 and applies until the end of 2028.
The offer includes a special payment of one percent of the average annual gross salary in mid-2027, payable only upon reaching a certain minimum net sales return.
IG Metall is demanding five percent more wages from November and is announcing warning strikes; it criticizes the offer as too low and without prospects for employment and locations.
Gesamtmetall President Udo Dinglreiter emphasizes the unity in assessing the crisis, calls for expanded differentiation in the collective agreement and a new instrument to secure investments and employment.
Berlin. In times of need, employers in the German metal and electrical industry are coming together: for the first time in collective bargaining history, they have simultaneously presented a coordinated offer in five collective bargaining areas at the start of the second round of negotiations in regional collective bargaining.
Accordingly, the collective wages for the approximately 3.7 million employees in the metal and electrical industry are to increase by 1.3 percent from July 2028, the employers' association Gesamtmetall announced on Tuesday. The new collective agreement is scheduled to run for 26 months until the end of 2028.
In addition, the employer's offer provides for a special payment of one percent of the average annual gross salary in mid-2027. However, only companies that achieve a certain minimum net sales return should pay the full amount.
In addition, the employers want to talk to the union about the high sickness rates and measures to reduce medical costs. They are also pushing to be able to introduce artificial intelligence (AI) into companies more quickly.
IG Metall rejected the offer as inadequate. In Baden-Württemberg, for example, it falls well short of the expectations of the employees and does not contain any viable prospects for the future of the locations and jobs.
From November onwards, the union is demanding five percent more wages and 110 euros higher training allowances for employees in the metal and electrical industry. She wants to limit the next collective agreement to twelve months.
"The wage increase is too low and comes too late. This means a loss of real wages for the employees," said Barbara Resch, negotiator for IG Metall in the southwest. At the same time, she announced warning strikes from November 1st.
Above all, there is a lack of a concept that would lead employment and locations in Baden-Württemberg into the future, said Resch. "This makes it difficult to achieve a good result quickly. The employees need security for their income and their jobs. For us, these are inseparable."
IG Metall had also previously called for the collective agreement to be differentiated according to the situation of the individual companies, albeit in the form of profit sharing. What is needed is a “package that does justice to all companies,” demanded Resch. "Anyone who stumbles needs support. Anyone who makes a profit must invest in the location and employees. In any case, employees need at least an inflation adjustment and a salary increase that is reflected in the table."
The background is the difficult situation in large parts of the industry. According to Gesamtmetall, almost 350,000 jobs have been lost there since 2019. Car manufacturers and their suppliers as well as mechanical engineers in particular have massive problems. At the same time, booming companies in the armaments sector, aerospace and rail vehicle construction are also included in the scope of the collective agreement.
The employee representatives agreed on the extent of the crisis, said Gesamtmetall President Udo Dinglreiter. But “the extent of the threat to tens of thousands more jobs has clearly not yet sunk in to large parts of the union,” he added.
Dinglreiter called the unusual joint offer from five regional associations on Tuesday a “clear signal of the unity of our associations” in the “longest and most serious structural crisis in this industry since the founding of the Federal Republic”. The associations conveyed it to IG Metall at the start of the second round of negotiations in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia, Lower Saxony and the north. The other tariff areas will follow shortly.
“The metal and electrical industry has been in a structural downward trend since 2018, because no longer competitive location conditions such as excessive labor costs make production in Germany unprofitable for many of our companies,” said Dinglreiter. It is therefore now important to stop the progressive deindustrialization and the now dramatic loss of jobs.
It is essential for a solution that the existing “automatic differentiation” in the collective agreement is expanded and established permanently. What is meant is the permitted, regulated deviation from minimum standards. According to this instrument of collective bargaining law, company management is allowed to reduce one-off payments without consulting the union if the company meets the conditions for this.
But there must also be “an operational instrument to secure investments, innovations, locations and employment,” said the Gesamtmetall President.
At the same time, Dinglreiter appealed to the collective bargaining partners' ability to compromise: Especially in the metal and electrical industries, they have proven time and again that they "find the strength to make smart collective bargaining policy decisions in extraordinary crisis situations."
