Research Paper on Labor Relations: Germany Strikes

Introduction

Increased competition in the international market has caused a strain on Germany in the industrial field. This strain is evident through the increased unemployment and loss of jobs. This may have been caused by the fact that many people concentrate on the price of their products more than the quality of the products they produce. They therefore end up bringing to the market low quality goods that they sell at high prices, which are not proportional to goods quality. Slow response to newer and more efficient technologies by the Germans may also be a contributing factor. Many writers have come up with different interpretations of the long-term trends that have been occurring in Germany. The decline in the competitiveness of Germany in the industrial field is believed to have begun in the 1990s.Despite this Germany remains to be the second best exporter in the world.

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In the 1990s, the then president thought fewer regulations in the labor market would be good for the German economy. This would directly challenge the methods of production and in turn not be favorable for the unions. This was followed by the Japanese taking up the positions of the Germans in the market. The Japanese became better in their modes of production and were more effective compared to the Germans who were the best industrial producers before then. Germany later faced a reduction in the growth of domestic demand. This to some extent was believed to be as a result of lower birth rates in the country and also more unemployment among its citizens (Dribbusch, 2016).

Between 1980 and 1989 other competitor countries such as Japan, Italy and France were far much better than Germany in terms of their yearly growth of GDP. German then began to have a challenge of reduced profits from investments in their own country and opted to invest in foreign countries. The competitiveness of Germany was raised as a way of trying to improve its labor relation, which was started by the employers of the country.

Changes that have been recently made in Germans labor market have been viewed by its workers to be non-friendly. These changes have been made against the increase of wages for the employers. Some of these changes have already been implemented where some employers have faced a decrease in their wages. This however has been viewed as a threat to the productivity of employees since if they are not contented with their wages they therefore are likely not to give their best in the industries. These changes have also led to deviations in the amount of money paid to workers in the same field hence creating inequality among the employers. Identification of the workers has therefore changed from recognition of the skills one has to the recognition of the firm that one works with.

The difference in wages of the people who have the same skills has led to the complication of memberships in the trade unions where the leaders are unable to clearly define who should belong to which trade union. The changes implemented in the labor market later led to consequences such as increased disputes in the field of labor and also to a large extent withdrawal in any discussions directed to the labor market by the employees (Wunderlich, 2015).

Through time, different people have come up with different proposals that they believe can be a solution to Germans labor market. Employers have continually demanded that there be a restructuring where their needs will be paid attention to and have their wages increased. There has been continued effort in trying to create new fields for the employees where they can work with reduced regulations concerning labor and enjoy flexibility. This has been done by bringing up new models of vehicles where employers can negotiate the terms of payment. Some employers took part in the getting out from the circles of having collective agreements. This has been done as an effort to do away with the existence of peak organizations and promoting uniformity among the employees.

In 1996 there was an effort made whose aim was to ensure that unemployment was reduced by half in the year 2000. Some of the resolutions made were such as ensuring that working time was made more flexible. Time accounts were made where the people were supposed to record the amount of hours they worked every day and the working hours would be counted annually and not restricted to one day. In some companies, the employers were supposed to reduce the total working time in a week. There was also an effort made toward paying for extra hours that the individuals spent working when they were supposed to be out of work. The unions also made efforts towards increasing the wages of the employers, which would in turn reduced disputes between the workers and the employers ensuring that the workers carry out their duties more willingly (Marks, 2014).

Bitterness among the workers also is a factor to blame for the workers strikes. The workers however are not able to leave the trade unions since for them the unions act as an umbrella that is likely to help solve their problems. Remaining in the unions therefore should not be interpreted as a sign of contentment among the employees. The unions continually ignored the employees' requests creating even more bitterness among them. In some instances, this has caused employees to skip days from work, which definitely negatively affects the output of the industry. An example is where the Bonn miners protested against their leaders and took days off from work illegally.

When counted annually this translates to a huge number of working hours lost due to the protests. The protests continued when the workers realized that the union leaders were ignorant of the complains. The leaders who also happen to be part of the employers channeled back the bitterness to the union members. This caused a repeated cycle where the workers continually raised issues about terms of work and were continually ignored; this increased their bitterness even more making them even more ineffective at work.

The people also suffered significant unemployment and there was a need for some effort towards collecting the situation as well as improve the wages of the employers. The people tried to bring about wage equalization by bringing two types of wage level. Kohl was fully in support of the employers however, he also made attempts to promote wage moderation which was not in line with the employers will. This led to the formation of a pact in the east whose intention was to revise the Treuhand policy. This caused bitterness among the workers and this led to strike that was supposed to take place for 60 days. Fortunately, the strike did not take long and happened for two weeks. In these two weeks, the employers definitely recorded huge losses in their industries. This also translated to a huge loss in the country since about 100 enterprises were involved.

Due to this strike, the wage equalization was delayed by two years where employers still persisted on having the wages remain the same. They therefore resorted to having lower unit wages where the people worked for lesser hours and were given lesser wages. They also tried to change the work arrangements by having more employees. And at the same time reduced the holiday hours and increased the working hours .These changes however did not bring any good but instead lowered the production due to lack of motivation among the employees (Feldmon, 2014).

Recently there has been a shift in the east where people have tried different ways of improving production. Many have tried to use the East Germany to test ideas hoping that if their ideas work out well in the east they will also work out well in the West Germany. We have therefore had the introduction of ideas such as hardship clauses in the east as a way of motivating the employees. It is not guaranteed however, the ideas that work out well in the east would do well when implemented in the west. We have had jobs being shared where people work for lesser hours and in turn are paid lesser. The case has been different for the teachers though who have been subjected to working for more hours without having their wages increased but remaining the same.

To date the operations of the unions and have not changed much and the employees have continually suffered the same disadvantages up to date. Today as much as employees are treated equally like the people who working in the private sectors they have no room to strike and to bargain. The employees' conditions are determined by associations. This gives a chance to have their will being misrepresented or being totally ignored making them to remain in the same working conditions over years. Civil servants have therefore remained to be at a disadvantage.

Recently to some extent, German employers have made bargaining decentralized. This has given space for flexibility while giving opportunities to fully utilize the labor market. We have also had employment remaining more or less the same due to increased privatization. In 2015, Germany introduced a minimum wage. This gave better working conditions for the employees due to the continued failure by the unions to bargain on behalf of workers. The minimum wage however, in the mid-2000s had been proposed by the unions but the employer associations were totally against it. Many governments before this had tried to solve the issue but they did not manage to do so (Vandaele, 2016).

In the recent day, Germany has been able to implement the lesser working hours and having working hours counted annually. They have also been in a position to ensure compensation for extra hours of work. Employers and states have also managed to make their own more competitive by providing training in vocation schools.

Existence of informal employment among the people has posed a danger where we could have employers who miss out on opportunities such as having insurance covers and enjoying pension. This has been seen as a threat in the future where such people may suffer poverty in the old age .Also the employers in the non-formal employment are at a disadvantage in that they cannot be members of unions which causes them the risk of getting lower wages.

The German confederation of employers' associations (BDA) and federation of German industries (BDI) have the responsibility to protect employers though they operate differently. The BDA is partly involved in bargaining while the BDI helps it members by listening to their complains and their suggestions.The federal Employment Agency have no records of strikes by the employees. Lately cases of strikes and lock outs that do not go longer that one-day and those that involve fewer than 10 workers are never recorded .This may be because they have a low impact or almost no impact on the country's economy and therefore not regarded as serious. The level of strikes in Germany today remains to be significantly low compared to that of other European countries. Warning strikes, which happen by the trade unions, are regarded to be more serious since they involve larger numbers of people but they are most of the times not recorded in detail.

Among the many industries in Germany, the metal sector remains to be the first in recording warning strikes. The two main reasons for the strikes just like in the past days are the attempt to increase the number of working hours by the employer and low wages. Other reasons were carrying out close production or the companies attempt to relocate to other areas. Relocation of a company to another area would mean that the employees too needed to relocate for them to maintain their job in the particular companies or on the other hand this may also mean that the employees would lose their jobs and had to go back to the business of looking for new jobs (Markovits , 2016).

According to law in Germany...