The myth of restrictive working-time agreements: Firms' working-time adjustment after exit from collective bargaining

Vinzenz Pyka and André Rieder

No 135, Discussion Papers from Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Chair of Labour and Regional Economics

Abstract: Employers in Germany argue that collective agreements restrict their flexibility concerning working hours. Using data from the IAB Establishment Panel for the years 2008 to 2024, we investigate working-time adjustments after exit from collective bargaining. We find that exit is associated with only a modest increase in weekly working hours of around 0.3 to 0.6 per cent using fixed-effects and event-study models, corresponding to eight to thirteen additional minutes per week. This adjustment occurs shortly after leaving collective bargaining coverage. We further find no evidence that other margins of working-time adjustment, such as Saturday or Sunday work, are used more extensively after exit. In contrast to previous survey evidence, our findings call into question that working-hours constraints are one of the main drivers of exit from collective bargaining coverage.

Keywords: Collective bargaining; Working hours; Exit from collective bargaining (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J22 J51 J53 J81 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lma
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:faulre:344102

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