A gap has opened between European wages and prices over the past 12 months. This naturally leads to heightened expectation for collective bargaining agreements across the continent. Even if CPI numbers improved towards the end of 2022, the wages still have a lot of catching up to do – which naturally leads to fears of a true wage-price-spiral as well as concerns over the political ramifications.. What should you look out for over the coming months? Where are wages likely to increase next? We take a look at 5 key European wage feuds that you should be watching and give you our prediction.

One way of measuring the gap between inflation and wage growth is to look at Job Postings as an early indicator that wage pressures could be maintained even with inflation on its way down across Europe (bar recent numbers from Spain and France). The gap opened through 2022 is simply too big to ignore for trade unions.