“ÖVP wants to introduce the 45-hour week through the back door with the help of the Economic Association!”

2023-09-15 10:36:44

AK-Auer: “Instead of demanding tax breaks for overtime, the business association should work with companies to ensure that overtime is paid at all!”

Vorarlberg (OTS) – The Vorarlberg ÖVP economic association director Christoph Thoma was quoted in the “Bludenzer Anzeiger” as saying: “If the SPÖ talks about 32 hours of working time with full wage compensation, then we also have to think about 45 hours with more salary and tax relief.” Manuela Auer , Vice President of the Vorarlberg Chamber of Labor, comments on this and sharply criticizes Thoma for his statements.

47 million extra and overtime hours per year are not paid

“In 2022 alone, 47 million extra and overtime hours were not compensated in terms of time or money in Austria. This corresponds to a total wage theft of 1.2 billion euros. “That is the real scandal and we should talk about it before we create additional incentives to make people work longer,” says Auer indignantly.

Tax relief for 10 hours per month is already the law

The calculation is simple: 2,804.25 euros gross divided by 4.33 working weeks per month and divided by 40 hours per week results in an hourly rate of 16.19 euros gross. Because only the 50 percent overtime bonus is tax-privileged, we are talking about 8.08 euros (16.19 / 2), which is tax-privileged per overtime. For ten hours of overtime, the supplements amount to a total of 80.80 euros. However, these are covered up to 86 euros per month.

“The possibility of working 45 hours per week is already covered by the Working Hours Act. When Mr. Thoma talks about tax relief for overtime work, he overlooks the fact that Section 68 Paragraph 2 of the Income Tax Act already provides tax relief for up to 10 hours of overtime per month. At this point I’m wondering how many more hours we should all be working according to Mr. Thoma? 45, 50 or even 60?” says Auer.

Trend towards reducing working hours instead of working more

“It’s obvious: anyone who wants to give tax benefits to overtime opens the door to more work. We know from countless studies that people want to work less. Reducing working hours promotes health and makes people more productive. This applies in particular to professions in the services of general interest that are so important to society – i.e. to employees in the areas of health/care, police, emergency services, fire services, city cleaning, retail and photography,” says Auer.

“While the majority of employees want shorter working hours, the ÖVP economic association director is pushing forward with such a proposal. It is obvious that the ÖVP business association has always clearly advocated for more working hours. We already saw this with the introduction of the 60-hour week,” says Auer.

Demand for relief from the labor factor

“It is misleading and disingenuous to tell employees that taxes on overtime are too high without telling the whole story: If Mr. Thoma really wants employees to have more net money in their wallets, he has to pass a general tax tax “Demand relief for the labor factor and an increase in wealth-related tax revenue,” concluded Auer.