Employees

WACKER’s workforce increased by 0.9 percent in 2021. 69.5 percent of WACKER’s employees work in Germany and 30.5 percent at international sites.

In 2020, as part of WACKER’s Shape the Future efficiency program, the company had reached an agreement with employee representatives on the framework for the planned job reductions. The reduction in Germany will be implemented solely through voluntary and socially responsible measures, such as phased early retirement arrangements and severance agreements. Forced layoffs are explicitly excluded in Germany under this project.

As a manufacturing company, WACKER has a large contingent of industrial workers (48.5 percent), roughly one-eighth (12.1 percent) of whom are women.

At €1,475.1 million, personnel expenses were higher versus the previous year (2020: €1,329.4 million).

They included outlays for social benefits and the company pension plan totaling €319.9 million (2020: €288.7 million).

Since July 2021, employees on standard pay scales at Wacker Chemie AG’s German sites have had access to Care-Flex Chemie, the supplementary long-term care insurance jointly established by the German Federation of Chemical Employers’ Associations (BAVC) and Industriegewerkschaft Bergbau, Chemie, Energie (IGBCE), the union representing workers in the German mining, chemicals and energy industries.

WACKER considers a company pension to be an important component of compensation. It is provided at most of our German and international sites. In Germany, WACKER provides a pension through Wacker Chemie AG’s pension fund (Pensionskasse der Wacker Chemie VVaG). Employees can supplement their company pensions by making their own additional contributions. As provided for in collective bargaining agreements, WACKER supports employees’ supplementary contributions. Employees in Germany receive an additional supplementary pension for that portion of their salary that exceeds the pension insurance contribution assessment ceiling. The fund has around 18,200 members and provides pension payments to some 9,100 retirees. The average pension paid in the reporting year was €691 per month. WACKER pays in up to four times an employee’s annual pension contributions, with the exact amount being determined by the type of agreement.

WACKER aims to reform the company pension plan for future pension entitlements and make it future-proof, attractive and more flexible. At the same time, this should relieve the burden on the company caused by low interest rates. To this end, WACKER is conducting negotiations with employee representatives. In the reporting year, corporate management and employee representatives established basic points of agreement whereby existing plans and vested benefits are preserved for current employees. The lifelong pension model is to continue to exist for this group of employees, accompanied by new payout options aligned with a person’s particular life situation. For new employees, the company pension is designed to provide an attractive direct retirement benefit commitment on a funded basis accompanied by high risk cover for emergencies. Employees in existing plans should also have the option of transferring to this new plan. In 2021, a contribution of €250 million was made to a trust company to partially finance WACKER’s pension obligations from direct commitments. This arrangement concerns those company pension benefits that go beyond the basic pension provided by Pensionskasse der Wacker Chemie VVaG.