On June 7, 2023, an info event of the university union for academic and artistic staff (BV13) took place. As this presentation was in German, we would like to report on the contents in more detail in this BR-Info.

The chairman of BV13 of the Public Service Union (GÖD), Martin Tiefenthaler, presented the background, developments and problems of the universities Collective Bargaining Agreement (KV) as well as the demands of the union and the status of the negotiation rounds so far. The basic problem with the KV is the originally created structure of the job groups and the associated advancement structures, since the implementation does not correspond with the original intentions. In the original drafting of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, the longer-term regular employment of academic and artistic staff was to be in job groups A1 (university professors) and A2 (staff with qualification agreements who become associate professors). Job group B of the KV was only to be used for fixed-term pre-doc or post-doc positions. At that time, it was not considered the norm for employees in this job group to be granted tenure. Instead, it was assumed that employees in this job group would take up a tenured position at a university after the fixed-term contract expired. This was also the basis for the overall very "short" advancement scheme of job group B, in which the highest classification is reached after only 16 years as a post-doc. In addition, advancement in this job group was only provided for every eight years, in contrast to the usual six years in A1 and A2.

Since the introduction of the Collective Bargaining Agreement in 2009, A2 positions are rather the exception than the norm at many universities. On the other hand, there is a growing group of senior scientists and senior lecturers in job group B, many of whom have also been granted tenure. In addition, other individual job profiles in job group B have been developed at individual Austrian universities, which have very different tenure requirements and which only partially provide for extra pay above the collective bargaining agreement. At WU, for example, development agreements have been created. A position holder has to complete a habilitation in order to be granted tenure, but one remains classified in job group B with overpay (whereby the total salary is below the minimum A2 salary and the extra pay results in part from a teaching allowance for a contractually increased teaching load).
The permanent positions created in job group B (especially senior lecturer and senior scientist positions) rarely receive overpay and, because of the logic of the collective bargaining agreement described above, do receive a comparatively low lifetime income. This can be seen both in a comparison with the civil servant lecturers formerly employed at universities (with a so-called "L1 salary"), and in a comparison with the current teacher salary system of 2019. Teachers of secondary level II (upper secondary education, AHS) in labor-intensive subjects, for example, receive a 13% ⁽¹⁾higher lifetime income than post-doc employees at a public university and have a 17% ⁽¹⁾ higher lifetime income than permanently employed pre-doc employees in the job group B.

In recent years, this imbalance has been raised by the university union with both the ministry and the national university federation (Dachverband). The union demands that the remuneration in job group B is raised to the level of teachers of secondary level II. The former Federal Minister of Education, Science and Research, Heinz Faßmann, had also seen the need for this increase in the past and supported it. In particular, the university union demands a shortening of the advancement from eight to six years and an increase of 500 EUR per advancement. To this end, representatives of the university union and the national university federation have met for negotiations in recent months.

In the first negotiation, the national university federation surprisingly declared that they do not see the need for a change and that they are unwilling to implement the above-mentioned demands. The representatives of the union were informed that the shortening of advancements is not an option. Instead, the representatives of the national university federation presented two additional steps every eight years with a EUR 230 increase of the respective minimum wage for each advancement as a conceivable option. This is not an acceptable offer for the union representatives. Before a planned follow-up meeting, the negotiations were suspended by representatives of the national university federation. The GÖD will nevertheless continue its efforts to have the talks resumed. Furthermore, it will address its concerns to the representatives of the relevant committees in the National Council. In addition, this topic will play an important role at the GÖD forum "Arbeitsplatz Universität" (University as a workplace) planned by the GÖD Executive Board in November of this year. We will keep you updated on these activities.

Finally, we would also like to discuss the above-mentioned individual salary schemes developed at WU. At WU, the largest group of permanent employees in the B-scheme are the Senior Lecturers Post Doc. In 2021, an individual pay scheme was introduced for this group. In comparison, however, they still have a 7% ⁽¹⁾ lower lifetime income than upper secondary education teachers. The development agreements mentioned above, where employees must hold a doctorate degree and complete a habilitation, receive a 2% ⁽¹⁾ higher lifetime income than upper secondary education teachers. There is no separate pay scheme for tenured senior scientists in the job group B, so this group remains in the Collective Bargaining Agreement B-scheme.

From the point of view of the academic staff council, it is therefore necessary - specifically under the current difficult labor market conditions - to make significant improvements in the remuneration schemes for pre-doc and post-doc academic staff members and to ensure that all parties involved are prepared to make permanent academic positions more attractive in the long term.