Editorial|Editorial
The labor market faces difficult and even more difficult challenges in the fall. The former are offered by export unions, the latter by nursing unions.
Labor market fall is starting in an exceptionally difficult situation. The industrial unions are still furious about the municipal sector contracts signed in June, which give the municipal sector wage earners for five years what the export unions agreed on and an additional percentage point per year on top.
In principle, the agreement was understandable, as it allowed the export sectors to define the reserve for wage increases, while it corrected the wage lag in the municipal sector, which is due to the salary slippage in the private sector.
However, the agreement was made to the credit of the export industry organizations, because they were not told about it. From Vientiala’s point of view, the municipal sector attached its own boat to their tow without asking.
The agreement also brought a new element to the negotiations in the export sectors. Until now, the industrial unions have assumed that they are trying to secure the purchasing power of wage earners without jeopardizing the competitiveness of Finnish work. With this way of thinking, the salary increases in the fall would be at the level of the euro countries at around four percent.
However, the current four percent agreement would mean that salaries in the municipal sector would rise by five percent. Where would that money be taken from? In the new situation, the export unions are no longer responsible not only for Finland’s international competitiveness, but also for the sustainability of the public finances, and there is a bigger burden than even the strong-backed trade union boss wants to carry.
One the alternative is, of course, to just apply for the biggest possible salary increases and let others take care of the big picture. Bridge on the line for example, Ismo Kokko has been the chairman of the automotive and transport industry association AKT. The risk in this case is the clamor for wage increases and the spiral of inflation, which eventually eats away at both purchasing power and competitiveness. It is for these reasons that the deputy speaker of the parliament Antti Rinne (sd) is kept solution of the municipal sector as “exceptionally unsuccessful” and “dangerous”.
Industry has a long experience of coping with impossible situations. The government’s tax carrot has often been used to help, which Finance Minister Annika Saarikko (Centre) has already had time to glimpse. However, it doesn’t seems to taste good now even more so for employers than for employees.
SAK chairman Jarkko Eloranta would like to transfer social security payments transferred from employers to employees in the 2016 kiky agreement back to employers. Jyri Häkämies, the chairman of the Confederation of Finnish Industries (EK), already had time to knock down the proposal, but it can still come back to the table when ways are being sought to keep the salary increase percentage, or the so-called general level – the one to which the municipal sector attached its towline – reasonable.
Export industry the negotiations are only in the warm-up phase, as the current agreements are valid until the end of November. The nursing unions Tehy and Super have also set their sights on the turn of the year. At the same time, this spending can be accompanied by extensive labor disputes, an economic recession and an energy crisis.
The nurses have already received the raises brought by the contract in the municipal sector, and there is also a salary harmonization in the welfare areas, which according to the employer in the municipal sector, KT, will increase annual labor costs by 5.8 percent. On top of these increases, the nurses’ unions are also seeking large salary increases of their own.
Elina Pylkkänen, undersecretary of the Ministry of Labor and Economy, and Martti Hetemäki, former state secretary of the Ministry of Finance, headed the mediation board in the municipal sector in the spring. suggested on Saturday, that a new, more encouraging salary system for caregivers would be developed with the money available from the municipalities’ salary program and harmonization.
It seems to be difficult to sell the idea to nursing unions. They consider that both amounts of money are already in their own pockets and no longer on the negotiating table. Why would they pay anything for what they count on getting anyway?
The employer sees it differently: in its opinion, this money is still on the negotiation table, and no other money is coming to the table.
The editorials are HS’s positions on a current topic. The articles are prepared by HS’s editorial department, and they reflect the magazine principle line.
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