Status: December 21, 2021 10:36 a.m.
High inflation completely eroded wage increases in the third quarter. The European Central Bank expects inflation to last longer than initially expected.
The increases in gross wages were completely eroded by high inflation in the third quarter of this year. The gross monthly income rose by 3.9 percent compared to the previous year, as the Federal Statistical Office announced.
However, consumer prices rose by the same amount: “Accordingly, there was no real wage increase compared to the previous year,” said Susanna Geisler, head of earnings statistics at the Federal Statistical Office.
“Inflation not so temporary”
According to the European Central Bank, these price increases are likely to last longer: “Our inflation is more stubborn and – let’s say – not as temporary as we had expected,” said ECB Vice President Luis de Guindos yesterday.
It should remain at over three percent in the coming year and only fall below the long-term target of two percent towards the end of the year, according to de Guindos. However, the predictions are fraught with great uncertainty, among other things because of the development of the corona pandemic. That is why the ECB does not want to change anything in its cheap money policy for the time being.
Wages partially back to pre-crisis levels
The pandemic situation also determines the situation on the German labor market. For the first time since February, more people were on short-time work in November, but the number of short-time workers fell compared to the previous year. As a result, the working week normalized overall, and gross earnings rose as a result. This is mainly due to the fact that the short-time allowance does not count towards gross earnings.
The effects of the pandemic caused wages to fall by 0.7 percent last year. Most recently, the sectors that were particularly hard hit by lockdown measures have recovered: in the catering and travel agencies, gross wages have already returned to pre-crisis levels. In the aviation and hotel industries, on the other hand, they are still below the 2019 figures despite strong growth.