Besamusca, J. (2025). How the standard disappeared from standard working time. A scoping review of literature on collective bargaining regarding standard and non-standard working times in Europe. WageIndicator Foundation, Utrecht University, Central European Labour Studies Institute, University of Girona.
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ABSTRACT
While much policy and scholarly attention goes to the negotiation of pay in collective bargaining agreements, there is relatively little attention to the hours to which these pay rates refer. Yet, the wages employees earn cannot be understood without reference to working hours: Working hours tell us how much effort we need to put in to earn the negotiated wages (Rubery et al., 2005). In
consequence, weekly working hours play an important role in understanding whether wages are adequate and working time reductions can constitute an alternative method of increasing wages (c.f., Piasna et al., 2024; Rubery et al., 2005). Moreover, different pay rates are often negotiated depending on the timing, predictability and variability of work hours. Premium pay for
inconvenient hours (e.g., shifts, nights, weekends, overtime) can constitute an important part of monthly incomes, which may help especially low skilled workers make ends meet (Ilsøe, 2012; Piso, 2022).
The BARTIME project on the monetary rewards of working time dimensions in collective bargaining and in the working population, funded by the European Commission’s Directorate General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion (Project No. 101126498), studies the pay associated with three dimensions of working time arrangements in 24 EU member states: (a) the length of the
working week, including part-time, overtime and the number of working days per year; (b) work outside of core working hours (9 to 5), such as shifts, evenings, weekends, and nights; and (c) the variability and predictability of working day start and end times, including on-call work and the extent to which workers have control over these hours.
This report, which constitutes deliverable 2.1 of the BARTIME project, reports the findings from a scoping review of existing academic literature on developments in collective bargaining regarding the pay for standard and non-standard working times in Europe. Together with a concurrent study of coded working time provisions in collective agreements in EU and two expert meetings with trade unionists, employers, policy makers and academics, this report asks how pay for working time is negotiated in collective agreements. These studies do not investigate working time patterns or about wage levels per se. They focus exclusively on the relationship between pay and working time.