After the robust collective bargaining agreements in the retail sector and the high demands of the railway workers, it is clear to business journalist Georg Wailand that prices for the end customer can now also be increased in many areas. His prognosis for the coming year is also gloomy: “We are facing the most difficult half of the year, namely 2023″…
The mood of the trade chairman of the Chamber of Commerce, Rainer Trefelik, is correspondingly subdued. “It was a short night,” he sums up the negotiations between the social partners in the conversation on krone.tv with Katia Wagner. He also believes that a “difficult time” is now upon us as the “buying mood is at its lowest level since the 1990s”, electricity costs are putting business owners in trouble and rising wages now need to be managed. “With this we are only promoting Amazon,” he warns.
Union members: ‘Only strike if it is really necessary’
In the retail sector, the leverage effect was great: the union announced strikes in the run-up to Christmas if an agreement could not be reached. However, the general manager of gpa Vienna, Mario Ferrari, explains why strikes are necessary: ”We will only do this if you don’t get any further at the negotiating table”. The retail employees had done a lot especially during the pandemic years and therefore deserved “appreciation in the form of money”.
Would you rather have a high one-off payment or a salary increase?
Valuation in the form of one-off payments would not have been acceptable, according to “Momentum Magazin” author Barbara Blaha: “Any entrepreneur can do that if he wants to be a good employer.” sustainable wage increase. “Calculated from life you leave behind thousands of euros,” explains Blaha. If a company has to close because of the KV diplomas, she believes: “Then the business idea didn’t work after all”.
ÖBB pays the taxpayer twice
The head of the think tank Agenda Austria, Franz Schellhorn, described Monday’s railway workers’ strike as a “turning point in social policy”. In general, it is “remarkable” to him that an industry “strongly protected by the state” is now taking over wage management. The taxpayer would now “pay twice” because of the supposedly rising ticket prices and his tax money flowing to the ÖBB. He warns of a “wage-price spiral” in which higher wages are now driving up prices.
“There Will Be Many Bodies”
The forecasts for the coming year are not equally rosy for all participants. The head of the economic department of the “Krone”, Georg Wailand, paints a particularly bleak picture: “Many corpses will swim past you in the river”. Once again, politicians are called upon to support where necessary.
You can watch “Katia Wagner – the talk” every Wednesday at 8:15 pm on krone.tv and at 11:00 pm on ntv Austria. Join the discussion and tune in!
In the show of the same name, Katia Wagner discusses socio-political issues affecting Austria every Wednesday with guests from politics and society.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
