Top 5 common misconceptions on the European Wage Union

“Equal wages for equal work,” Jobbik and its Eastern European allies want this fundamental right to be finally included in the EU Treaties.

That is why the European Citizens’ Initiative was launched and it was eventually given the green light by the European Commission. However, there are a lot of misconceptions and malevolent rumours being spread about the project to eliminate European wage inequalities. Some of this false information is planted in people’s minds by the Hungarian government’s whispering campaign. This article refutes the most common ones.

Let’s take a look at the most typical objections to the concept.

1. You can’t start paying German wages in Hungary overnight

This is one of the most common anti-Wage Union “arguments” desperately blared by the government’s propaganda machine even though the wage union would obviously not bring western wages to Hungary overnight, and Jobbik never claimed that it would.

The essential aim of the initiative is to help the ideal of “equal wages for equal work” (which means closing the gap between the wages of individuals working in a similar position and similar conditions in different parts of the EU) become a fundamental European right, the legal enforcement of which must be solved by the European Commission.

Thus true integration could finally begin and there would be a chance to spend cohesion funds in a purposeful way, contrary to what happens now when the EURO billions that fail to be stolen by the government and its circle are wasted on spectacular but useless projects generating business for big western corporations.

So this is not an immediate solution but a complex and time-consuming process which should actually have been completed in the past 13 years but has been sabotaged jointly by Fidesz and the Socialist Party in Hungary.

2. Hungarian enreprises would be unable to pay Western wages, half the country would go bankrupt

The refutation of the next common “counter-argument” comes from the answers to the misconceptions above: since the project does not involve an immediate wage increase but a gradual reform of the regulations, there is no need to fear that the economy would collapse.

Such fears are especially unfounded since, as Gábor Vona outlined in his programme speech, a functional wage union requires a radical reform of national economies. The reform would involve the reallocation of the incredibly high tax discounts and subsidies currently enjoyed by multinational companies to Hungarian small and medium enterprises.

According to the data published by Hungary’s Central Statistical Office, the former Socialist governments spent an average of 6.4 million HUF on each job created, while Mr Orbán’s cabinet pays an average of 12.6 million HUF to multinational companies for a job that often involves underpayment, unworthy conditions and overwork. Furthermore, the government covers all employment taxes and contributions of big companies for 4 years in advance.

Just imagine what would happen if these funds could be used by Hungarian SMEs to create jobs and increase wages!

Besides, the EU’s cohesion funds could also be spent on the Hungarian enterprises that create quality jobs locally. These measures could achieve a key goal of the initiative: to enable everyone to prosper in their own homeland.

3. If there is a Wage Union, big business will flee from Hungary

This is another common objection and misconception in terms of the initiative, and the servants of international big business are ready to flaunt it any time they see a proposal to eliminate European inequalities of living standards.

Undoubtedly, the interests of multinational companies would be somewhat curbed if the new principle is adopted but you should not believe that international businesses are omnipotent: if Eastern Europe together and its national states on their own show the sufficient resolve, they can force these companies to swallow the bitter pill.