The European Union will soon adopt a text to move towards the establishment of a minimum wage. A taboo subject for a long time, the goal is also to change morals. Because in reality, the establishment of a European minimum wage is still far from becoming a reality…
This is a historic moment for the European Union. The 27 countries are close to validating a text on a European minimum wage. Long a divisive issue between member countries, almost all of the 27 have announced that they will vote for a text that comes close to a minimum wage for the continent. But in detail, it’s not exactly the minimum wage one might have imagined.
Minimum wage but…
The objective of these discussions was to find a point of agreement that would reduce wage inequalities between Europeans by having a “decent standard of living”. But the first major obstacle for the defenders of the text: there is no minimum wage anywhere in the Union. In fact, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Finland, Italy and Sweden base employee income on collective bargaining in the company. For these countries, tackling the idea of a minimum wage on a European scale is a limit far from being crossed. Sweden and Denmark have even gone so far as to announce that they will not vote for this text. However, we are far from the idea that we can have of a European minimum wage…
Binding rules for a non-binding text
If the basic objective is to establish “binding rules” only for the 21 countries of the European Union that already have a minimum wage, everything remains in fact quite flexible. The text plans to support transparency when a minimum wage in a country changes. But no minimum wage will be imposed on the six countries that have no minimum wage. There will also be no minimum threshold or harmonization of minimum wages at European level. A real disappointment for supporters of a social minimum across the continent.
A statement from Parliament explains that the 21 countries “will have to assess whether their existing legal minimum wage is sufficient to ensure a decent standard of living, taking into account their own socio-economic conditions, purchasing power” via a basket of goods and services at real prices, as well as “national levels of productivity and long-term development”.
According to some elected officials, it is assured that the text will lead to many changes. “Through this law, we are reducing wage inequalities and pushing for the lowest paid workers in Europe to benefit from higher wages,” explained Dutch MEP Agnès Jongerius. Legislation will side with increased collective bargaining. States in which less than 80% of the workforce is protected by a collective agreement will be forced to create an action plan to gradually increase this proportion and involve the social partners more in the regular review of the minimum wage.