Nobody has sung the connection between wages and the joys of consumption as aptly as the wisest of all Cologne dialect bands, the Bläck Fööss. In “Lange Saturday en d’r City” the Cologne musicians pay homage to a family consisting of “Pap”, “Mam” and their little daughter “Titti”. The three of them roam around the shops for hours, buying all sorts of things. The Fööss also sing about why they do this: “Because Jeld jejeben hat.”
The summer months are traditionally a peak of consumption. The holidays are coming, the hotel room, the flight, the ice cream on the beach, all of this has to be paid for. So it’s good that there is a little extra “jeld” for this time, to speak with the Fööss again: the unions fought for holiday pay in many sectors – mainly in the 1950s and 1960s. Similar to the Christmas bonus, it was originally intended to benefit low-level workers and employees in particular, so that they too could afford holidays and festivals.
However, there is little left of the noble basic idea, as the trade union-affiliated Hans Böckler Foundation reports: According to this, less than half of all employees in the private sector in Germany receive holiday pay at all – and precisely among the low earners their proportion is particularly high at 38 percent small amount. This is the result of a survey conducted by the foundation among around 60,000 employees.
This is not the only imbalance that can be seen from the data. Structural problems, which are known from other contexts, also exist with the special payments. The gender pay gap, for example: Male employees (50 percent) receive vacation pay significantly more often than women (41 percent). West Germans (49 percent) get it more often than East Germans (34 percent). Finally, one may also find it unfair that the holiday allowance, if it is paid, is particularly low where people earn little anyway: in agriculture, for example, or in the hotel and catering industry, where it is an average of 240 euros. In high-wage sectors, on the other hand, it is many times higher: Employees in the chemical industry get five times as much at 1200 euros, employees in the metal industry at 2235 euros almost ten times as much.
The differences can be explained by the peculiarities of the trade unions. Wherever they bind many people – in large companies, in industry, in West Germany – holiday pay is paid more and more frequently. The employee representatives have the power to enforce it through collective agreements. On the other hand, where they are weak – in the East and in the service sector, where an above-average number of women work – there is less or nothing. Seen in this way, an appeal can also be read from the survey. If more people organize themselves into unions, not only will working conditions improve overall, but there will also be more holiday pay. For ice cream on the beach, for a long Saturday in the city – or whatever else you want to spend it on.