Aargau Metal Wage Talks Stick on Inflation That Has Already Fallen

BADEN - Metal and machine employers in Aargau opened the spring wage round with modest offers, pointing to the SNB's cooler inflation print. Unions said compulsory premiums and rents had already eaten the last settlement. Several works committees in Baden and Brugg scheduled extra meetings.

Order books, described as thin in January, have not filled enough to make employers generous. Nobody called a strike. Nobody called the talks finished.

A canton that ships first

When German customers delay, Aargau delays the night shift. Pay talks in a thin order book are a different sport from pay talks in a boom.