News

On September 17, two German social partners - the Confederation of German Trade Unions (Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund - DGB) representing around 6 million workers and the employer’s association of the temporary staffing industry (Verhandlungsgemeinschaft Zeitarbeit - VGZ) - signed an agreement on pay which would guarantee increases to the minimum wage of temporary agency workers till 2016.

According to the agreement, temp agency employees will receive three increases which will vary depending on the year and the region (east or west). As of January 2014, the minimum wage in western Germany will be €8.5/hour before tax and €7.86 in the eastern Germany. The next agreed increase will be in April of 2015 and the final one in 2016 when the West will increase its hourly wage by +2.3% to €9.00 and the East will increase by +3.7% to €8.50.

Germany is one of the countries with the highest number of temporary agency workers - in average, around 800 thousand people per year.