Background information

Wages and working conditions of health care workers and a strong labour shortage have been a matter of concern for long; in 2018 government even set up an expert commission to address these problems. Industrial relations are poorly developed, a sectoral collective agreement is not in place; a statutory minimum wage is set by a sectoral minimum wage commission composed of various stakeholders. Major church-related organisations, NGO and private employers do not engage in collective bargaining; employers criticize the underfinancing of the statutory heath insurance.

Against this background the new sectoral agreement on a COVID-19 bonus for health care workers is a very new development. Some NGO founded the employer organisation BVAP for changing employment relations in the sector by engaging in collective bargaining. Wage negotiations with the United Services Union ver.di are ongoing since late 2019. Business organisations are highly critical of the new agreement saying that they do not see where the money shall come from.

The collective bargaining partners BVAP and ver.di wish for their agreements - this one as well as future ones - to be extended by the labour minister.

Content of measure

The agreement covers skilled and unskilled care workers as well as workers in managerial positions in residential care homes and in ambulant care. They shall be paid an extra €1,500 bonus in July 2020 on top of their monthly wage as compensation for the very strong burden they carry because of COVID-19. Part time workers shall receive the bonus depending on the number of hours worked. Trainees in vocational training shall receive €900 extra.

The agreement is independent of the collective bargaining partners' ongoing negotiations of a sectoral wage agreement. The bonus shall be paid on top of and shall have no impact on the level of the wage.

Use of measure

Only preliminary data is available. A study by the tax consultancy ETL Advision on wage comparisons in the care sector concludes that by December 2020, more than 40% of employees nationwide in the outpatient and semi-inpatient care companies studied had not received the tax-free Corona premium. The study covers more than 1,000 care services.

Contents

• Bonuses

Target groups

Workers	Businesses	Citizens
Employees in standard employment	Sector specific set of companies	Does not apply to citizens

Actors and funding

Actors	Funding
Social partners jointly	Companies Employer

Social partners

Social partners' role in designing the measure and form of involvement:

	Trade unions	Employers' organisations
Role	Agreed (outcome) incl. social partner initiative	Agreed (outcome) incl. social partner initiative
Form	Not applicable	Not applicable

Social partners' role in the implementation, monitoring and assessment phase:

• Social partners jointly
• Main level of involvement: Sectoral or branch level

Involvement

N/A

Views and reactions

Agreement settled by the newly founded federal association of employers in the health care sector (Bundesverband der Arbeitgeber in der Pflegebranche, BVAP) - members are a.o. the Arbeiterwohlfahrt (AWO) and the Arbeitersamariterbund (ASB) - and the United Services Union (Vereinte Dienstleistungsgewerkschaft, ver.di).

Sectors and occupations

Sources

• 06 April 2020: Sectoral agreement on bonus for elder care workers (www.verdi.de)
• 16 April 2021: Study on the corona bonus - ver.di demands payment (www.verdi.de)