Sorry, but compound words have connotations, just as any other words. German labour history is well documented and well researched and anyone familiar with areas such as the Ruhrgebiet or Siemensstadt (particularly interesting at the moment as Siemens is “taking away” / withdrawing 1000s of jobs in Siemensstadt) can see for themselves how the paternalistic give and take of the labour market worked historically and is still working to some extent today.
The Arbeitnehmer / Arbeitgeber model of work clearly differentiates industrial workers from Handwerker, who provide for themselves through their craft with their own hand. No one can give or take your craft away!
An Arbeitnehmer (employee) is a “work taker” , an Arbeitgeber (employer) a “work giver”. Some German think (overthink imho), that this is backward. After all, it’s the employee who does the work, the employer does not, just reaps the lion share of the profits generated by said work.
It’s mostly a case of “No shit sherlock, language isn’t logical”.
Or rather, it very likely comes from the time when Arbeit was assigned, while the vast majority of people had no say about it at all.
Please note that I am not so much downplaying the German terms but pointing out how the English terms, by using French roots (“employer” instead of “job-giver”) gave the English term more room to divorce itself from deeper meaning. German, in using native terms, cant as easily get rid of that relationship and all the baggage that you point out.
I agree and while I applaud the IGMetal for sticking up for the rights of union members, I fear that in the end it will only encourage management to find new and creative ways in the future from actually offering genuine employment contracts to people. I won’t name the company here but in my previous capacity as freelance consultant I worked with several large companies in the manufacturing industry in Germany. While visiting at a logistics center I asked the person giving the tour how many employees worked here. He said, “20”. I was confused, there were certainly more than 20 people on the floor. He explained, " there are 20 employees of this company. The rest are external service providers, second and third tier as well as short term workers. A total of 140."
Ten years previously, there were 160 company employees at that location.
There are several interesting articles in the Germany papers about the number of employees Siemens has been laying off in Nuremberg/Erlangen areas.
I agree with basically everything you did. My point is that they want people to join to have a higher degree of organisation within the industry.
Also, in the German system, it is considered highly unusual to have two different types of contracts for union members and non-union members. If any employer tries to do that - and of course they do - the unions are usually going to war. And rightly so. “Wahrung des Betriebsfriedens” is a goal for both employees and employers, but one job - one pay (etc) is a political goal the unions fought for long and hard.
Again, you are absolutely right there is a strong neo-liberalist tendency to undermine that. And if the degree of organisation falls further, the IG Metall will have a serious problem. Hence the publicity-making call for 28 h: get people discussing, involved, and organised. That’s the pitch, and that’s the project, from my POV.
