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Source: picture alliance/Mandoga Media

WSI: Key research topics: Europe and European policies

The research area monitors economic, social and political developments on the European level and evaluates the consequences, risks and opportunities for employees, households, firms and the future of the welfare state.

The development of transnational European industrial relations provides an opportunity to increase the scope for shaping policy on companies, collective bargaining and trade unions in response to the constraints imposed by globalisation. The WSI promotes the development of European Works Councils and the Europeanisation of collective bargaining.
 

Main research topics

economic and financial policy issues in Europe - EU democratic deficit - monitoring of EU decisions - impact of European institutions (ECJ, ECHR, ECB) - transnational labour relations and national working and living conditions

Selected Publications

Malagardē, Athēna / Sengayrac, Simon-Pierre / Schulten, Thorsten : The minimum wage in Greece, France and Germany

The study provides a comparative overview of the new mechanism for setting the statutory minimum wage in Greece in relation to the French and German models.

Source: fes.de

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Müller, Torsten / Schulten, Thorsten : After Landmark EU Court Judgement: The EU Minimum Wages Directive Is Alive and Kicking

The landmark ruling validates the directive's approach to adequate wages and collective bargaining, dealing only minor setbacks to its implementation across Europe.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Höpner, Martin / Schmidt, Susanne K. / Seikel, Daniel : Asymmetry resolved? Revisiting negative and positive European integration

Is Fritz W. Scharpf's influential theory of an institutional asymmetry between negative and positive integration in the European Union still relevant? The authors find that the asymmetry persists, albeit in a nuanced way.

Source: tandfonline.com

Open access 

Luebker, Malte / Schulten, Thorsten : WSI Minimum Wage Report 2025

Many EU countries are raising minimum wages significantly in 2025, boosting purchasing power amid falling inflation. Driven by the EU Minimum Wage Directive, this trend continues—though for Germany, a structural increase is still necessary to make progress towards an adequate minimum wage.

Source: WSI

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Arnholtz, Jens / Seikel, Daniel : Promoting Social Europe by reversing liberalisation?

The revision of the Posting of Workers Directive was supposed to be a milestone for a more social Europe. But a new study shows: Implementation in the member states fell short of expectations. The authors ask why MS that actively pushed for the revision did not exploit the new regulatory possibilities further. In addition to presenting comparative data on national implementation, they conduct in-depth case studies of countries that supported the revision at the EU level (Denmark, Finland, Germany).

Source: tandfonline.com

Open access 

Müller, Torsten / Schulten, Thorsten : The road to 80 % collective bargaining coverage

The Directive on Adequate Minimum Wages obliges the EU Member States with collective bargaining coverage of below 80 % to establish action plans to promote collective bargaining. The Policy Brief presents possible concrete measures.

Source: etui.org

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Interview with Daniel Seikel, 24.01.2025 : THE EUROPEAN TAILWIND FOR POVERTY-PROOF MINIMUM WAGES WOULD BE GONE

On January 14, the Advocate General at the ECJ recommended that the EU minimum wage directive be annulled. How likely is it that the judges will follow his vote? And what would the consequences be?

Source: Daniel Schoenen

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Schulten, Thorsten / Müller, Torsten, 22.01.2025 : EU Minimum Wage Directive Before the European Court of Justice: It’s Not All Over Now…

EU’s minimum wage directive under threat: Advocate General’s opinion sparks legal and social turmoil across Europe.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Eurofound 2024 : Workplace bullying, harassment and cyberbullying

While digitalisation of work offers many benefits, widespread access to digital devices has created new forms of antisocial behaviour. The report maps national regulatory instruments aimed at counteracting antisocial behaviours at work.

Source: eurofound

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Seikel, Daniel : The revision of the Posted Workers Directive

Revision of the Posted Workers Directive: trade unions and left-wing parties had been fighting for it for over 10 years – with a surprising success in June 2018. Daniel Seikel reconstructs and analyzes the political process of the revision.

Source: WSI

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Janssen, Thilo / Lübker, Malte : WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2023 / 2024

Inflation is wiping out the gains made by collective bargaining: In many EU countries, collectively agreed wage rates are below their 2015 level when adjusted for inflation. Hence, wages still need to catch up.

Source: WSI

WSI Report 97e, July 2024 (pdf) 

Eurofound 2024 : Minimum wages for low-paid workers in collective agreements

In this pilot project, Eurofound successfully established the feasibility of, and piloted, an EU-wide database of minimum pay rates contained in collective agreements related to low-paid workers.

Source: eurofound

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Janssen, Thilo / Lübker, Malte : WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2022 / 2023

Employees in the EU have suffered a dramatic loss of purchasing power: Real wages have fallen by 4 % in 2022 because of persistent inflation – driven initially by energy prices, but increasingly by higher profit margins.

Source: WSI

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Daniel Seikel : European integration, power resources and social classes

What does European integration mean for the balance of power of capital and labor? Daniel Seikel shows how power resources of wage earners are weakened by Europeanization through law and through monetary integration.

Source: tandfonline.com

article (open access) 

Blauberger, Michael / Heindlmaier, Anita : The European Labour Authority in Practice

ELA was founded to ensure an effective and fair enforcement of EU rules on labour mobility. Can it succeed in solving this challenging task with the given resources? A first analysis

Source: WSI

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Torsten Müller/Thorsten Schulten, 01.07.2022 : Minimum-wages directive—history in the making

The EU minimum wages directive is a milestone in the fight against in-work poverty. Now, it is more than ever up to the national political actors to raise minimum wages significantly and to strengthen collective-bargaining coverage.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Thorsten Schulten, 08.02.2022 : Germany on the way to adequate minimum wages

The German Ministry of Labor has presented a draft Minimum Wage Increase Act, which is also a strong signal of support for the EU Minimum Wage Directive.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Torsten Müller/Thorsten Schulten, 26.11.2021 : More ambitious European minimum-wages directive demanded

EU minimum wages: In comparison with the original commission proposal, the EMPL report adopted on 25.11.2021 marks a clear improvement. The confirmation by the plenary of the European Parliament has strengthened the negotiation mandate.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Wieteke Conen, Karin Schulze Buschoff (eds.) : Multiple jobholding in Europe

Multiple jobholding in Europe: job quality, challenges for socialprotection, digital platform work and the implications for unions, policy-makers and the regulation of work

Source: WSI

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Torsten Müller/Thorsten Schulten : Minimum wage directive: Yes - but ...

The draft minimum-wage directive is a crucial first step but more needs to follow on the way to a social Europe.

Source: socialeurope.eu

socialeurope.eu 

Daniel Seikel, Thorsten Schulten in: Working under pressure : Upgrading Public Services

Against the European trend, employment and working conditions in the German public sector have improved after the financial crisis. Trade union strategies played an important role.

Source: etui.org

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WSI Report 52, 09/2019 : Pragmatic solutions to save the euro

The reform of the euro zone is stuck. Against the background of political blockades, Daniel Seikel (WSI) and Achim Truger (University Duisburg-Essen) examine from a combined economic and political science perspective how the Euro can be prepared for the next crisis and develop a proposal of how, under the given circumstances, the room for maneuver within the existing framework of economic and monetary union can be extended in a pragmatic way in order to strengthen national fiscal policy as an instrument of macroeconomic stabilization.

Source: picture alliance/blickwinkel

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New book by Johannes M. Kiess, Martin Seeliger (eds.), Routledge 2019 : Trade Unions and European Integration

New European economic governance regime and the autonomy of collective bargaining: a fundamental conflict. The book chapter by Daniel Seikel (WSI) shows how reform measures imposed on programme countries have led to a substantial deterioration of the bargaining power of trade unions, undermining one of the cornerstones of post-war democratic governance.

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Journal of European Integration : Patterns of pooling and delegation after the crisis: old and new asymmetries

European integration after the euro crisis: Restoration of national control or upgrade of supranational autonomy? Daniel Seikel (WSI) analyses the key institutions of the reformed European economic governance,finding that control over risk-reducing and market-making institutions has been delegated to supranational institutions whereas control over risk-sharing and market-correcting institutions has remained in the hands of the member states.

Source: tandfonline.com

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