German wage keeps falling

On 19 December, Destatis published the statistics about the real German wage in the third quarter of the current year. According to the report, real earnings in Germany fell by an average 0.3 per cent from the third quarter of 2012 to the third quarter of 2013. In specific the nominal earnings rose by 1.3 per cent and consumer prices by 1.6 per cent over the same period. The decline in the real income sank at a pace not seen in about four years.
According to the results for the first three quarters of 2013, the real German wage will slightly decrease in 2013. Nominal earnings rose by 1.4 per cent in the first three quarters of 2013 compared with the same period in 2012, consumer prices were up 1.6 per cent. According to Deutsche Welle, Germans would have to put up with less to spend throughout the year, mirroring the situation in the crisis year of 2009.
The gross average German wage of a full-time employee in Germany was at €3,462 per month (excluding special payments) in the third quarter of 2013. Employees in the banking, insurance and energy sector enjoyed the highest average gross wages, while those in the catering sector recorded the lowest.
Unequal distribution of wealth
On 18 December, the chairman of the engineering workers' union IG Metall, Detlef Wetzel told Deutsche Welle, that the distribution of wealth in the richest country in the EU was more and more unequal during the last ten years.
"If one of the richest countries in the world cannot afford to spend some money on its pensioners, if the richest country cannot afford to reduce the abuse of contracted labour and service contracts and if it cannot afford to limit low wages, than I really don't know. In Germany we have the basic problem that in the last ten years the increase in prosperity has been very unequally distributed. It is about time that we turned back towards the employees again," Mr. Wetzel stressed.