Project:

Strategic aim of the project

The general purpose of the NEWIN - Negotianing Wage (In)equality project is to increase social partners (and policy makers) awareness about the contribution that collective bargaining has on inequality in societies. In line with this objective, the project investigates social partners views on and responses to the issue of growing wage inequality in five EU-countries: Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovak Republic and the United Kingdom. Precisely, the project has the following main objectives:

To analyse the challenges that social partners are facing concerning the issue of (growing) wage inequality at the several levels of industrial relations (national, sectoral and company levels) in the 5 EU-countries

To analyse social partners' view on their roles and responsibilities in regulating wage inequalities including minimum wages and top incomes

To analyse social partners' policy responses and collective bargaining strategies concerning age inequality, at the macro, the meso and the micro levels

To provide more detailed insights into experiences and results of collective bargaining at the national, sectoral, and company levels regarding the (re)gulation of wage inequality

Better understanding of the challenges, views, policy responses, and collective bargaining activities and their results in sectoral and national contexts

To analyse empirically the relationship between wage dispersion and industrial relations institutional characteristics, taking into consideration the economic crisis and recent developments

To disseminate and discuss the findings and lessons learned with social partners from the 5 countries involved, with European social partners, and across the whole EU to promote transnational learning

Specific ambits and activities

The project will use an interdisciplinary and multiple-method approach, combining both qualitative and quantitative research. I twill follow a cross-sectoral research design, analysing both the overall developments for the entire country and focusing in more detail on four sectors: banking, metal, retail and education.
Visit the collaboration platform for the project here.