Mara Yerkes & Jelle Visser
German collective bargainers seem to have been less prominent in their attempt to raise the profile
of part-time work and create a more sustainable balance of work and family life in comparison to
their Dutch colleagues, possibly reflecting lower levels of cooperation between the social partners,
and less coordination across sectors, using central agreements to recommend particular solutions
or norms.
Furthermore, new regulations allowing employees to earn up to 400 euros monthly, exempt from
payroll taxes and social security, serves to increase the number of ‘mini-jobs’ present in the German
labour market. These jobs are mostly found in the service sector, typically performed by women
and hardly satisfy conditions of “decent work” in terms of earnings, protection and rights (EIRO,
2003a). This development is likely to reinforce the negative qualities of part-time work and does
contribute to a “marginalisation” rather than a “normalisation” of part-time work. By actively
supporting the growth of short-hours jobs, the government allows marginal part-time work to grow,
part-time jobs that are often precarious and poorly paid. And while new legislation allows
employees to request a reduction in working hours, complementary legislation is necessary that
secures the rights and position of people choosing to reduce their working hours.
SOCIAL PARTNERS
The growth of part-time work is not attributable to the policies of the social partners either.
German trade unions responded similarly to Dutch unions, fighting the growth of part-time jobs, and
unlike their Dutch counterparts, German unions were less in need of developing a part-time
strategy. German unions were much stronger and more successful in pressing the collective solution
to work sharing by means of a reduction of working hours for all, and with fewer concessions on
flexible working time. Before unification in 1990 and the economic crisis that followed, the economy
performed better and unemployment was lower. Consequently, there was less pressure to create
part-time jobs (for young people and women) as a “second best” solution (compared to full-time
work) but always better than unemployment. Other typical pressures, like wage moderation or an
early central agreement in which employers adopted part-time work as a possible work-sharing
solution in times of high unemployment, like the 1982 Wassenaar agreement in the Netherlands,
were absent in Germany. Part-time work did not become a strategy for entry into the market for
paid labour by women, but rather it became a tool for flexibility in the service sector for employers
(Pfau-Effinger, 1998). This difference -whether part-time jobs result from the character of the
labour supply or derive from the flexibility needs of employers, tends to have a big influence on the
rights and conditions of part-time work, and on its image in society. Trade unions are slowly
changing their perspective and have become supportive of government legislation allowing
employees to request a reduction in working hours. Without specifically promoting part-time work,
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AIAS - UvA