Pattern Bargaining and Wage Leadership in Austria

Several contributions to the economic literature on industrial relations claim that wage bargaining in Austria is characterised by pattern bargaining or wage leadership: A certain bargaining unit, such as the metal workers, sets the going rate for the rest of the economy. If the wage leader takes the macroeconomic effects of high wage settlements into account, the outcome, namely wage moderation and small wage disparity, may be much the same as in a centralised procedure, where the peak union and employer organisations control wage bargaining.