ABSTRACT
Are minimal restrictions on cross-border labour mobility and maximum security of workers’ rights incompatible? Since the EU enlargement in 2004, there have been widespread fears that increasing East–West migration would put wages and labour standards in the receiving countries under massive pressure. Against the background of persistently high wage differences between Western and Eastern Europe, there might be a strong incentive for companies to use migrant workers who are willing to work under inferior conditions (Schulten 2011a). Moreover, in recent years national regulatory systems have been challenged by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) rulings in cases such as Laval, Viking Line, Rüffert and Luxembourg, tending to declare strong national wage regulation as contradicting the fundamental economic freedoms of services and establishment laid down in the EU Treaty (Cremers 2010; Dølvik and Visser 2009; Woolfson et al. 2010).
