Volkswagen plans pay freeze until 2030, works council vows resistance
Internal papers show VW's board wants zero pay rises worldwide through 2030. The works council calls the plan unrealistic, while IG Metall seeks a 5% raise.
Archive image · Photo: Dietmar Rabich / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
Volkswagen's management board wants to freeze pay across the group worldwide until 2030, according to the works council and the IG Metall union. HR managers have been instructed to impose zero pay rounds, a directive in force since early October, the works council said. Sueddeutsche Zeitung first reported the plan, citing a board-approved strategy paper called “Group Target Picture” that also foresees cuts to variable pay, bonuses and benefits.
Because of inflation, affected staff could lose about 10% of their real income by the end of the decade. VW employs around 275,000 people in Germany, about 130,000 of them under its in-house wage agreement. Volkswagen declined to comment on what it called speculation.
The works council called the plan unrealistic and expects strong resistance. IG Metall is seeking a 5% raise for VW staff and the roughly 3.7 million workers in Germany's metal and electrical industries in wage talks that are already under way. In September, VW's supervisory board approved a further 50,000 job cuts worldwide.