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Turkey - Compensation & Benefit Legislation

CAPITAL

Ankara

 

CLIMATE

Hot, dry summers with mild, wet winters. Harsher weather inland.

  

LANGUAGES

Turkish, Kurdish, Arabic and Katye.

 

LEGAL SYSTEM

Derived from various European continental legal systems. Accepts compulsory ICJ jurisdiction, with reservations.

 

CURRENCY

Turkish Liras (1 USD = 1,426,436 TRL as of March 1, 2002).

 

TURKEY - COST-OF-LIVING

ERI's Relocation Assessor is a recommended source for cost-of-living data.

 

TURKEY - EMBASSY/CONSULATES

U.S. Embassy at Ankara

110 Ataturk Boulevard

APO AE 09823

Kavaklidere

Ankara, Turkey 061000

Telephone: [90] (312) 455-5555

http://www.usemb-ankara.org.tr/

 

Consular Offices:

U.S. Consulate General in Istanbul

Mesrutiyet Caddesi

104/108 Tepebasi

Istanbul, Turkey

Telephone: [90] (212) 251-3602

Fax: [90] (212) 251-3218

 

U.S. Consulate in Adana

Atatürk Cad

Voli Yolu Bassa Apt Kat1

Adana Turkey

PSC 94 APO AE 09824

Adana, Turkey

Telephone: [90] (322) 459-1551

Fax: [90] (322) 457-6591 

 

Embassy of the Republic of Turkey at Washington D.C.

2525 Massachusetts Avenue N.W.

Washington D.C. 20008

Telephone: (202) 612-6700

Fax: (202) 612-6744

E-Mail: info@turkey.org

http://www.turkey.org/

 

TURKEY - HOLIDAYS

 

TURKEY - LEAVE

Annual Leave: Minimum 12 days paid leave per year.

 

Maternity Leave: 12 weeks – 66.7% of pay (paid for by social security).

 

TURKEY - MINIMUM AGE

The Constitution and labor laws forbid the full-time employment of children younger than age 15, with the exception of those 13 or 14 years of age who may engage in light, part-time work if enrolled in school or vocational training.

 

The Constitution also states that "no one shall be required to perform work unsuited to his/her age, sex, and capacity."  With this article and related laws, the Government undertakes to protect children from work unsuited to their age and capacity, such as underground mining, and from working at night. According to the Labor Law, children who attend school can work no more than 71/2 hours a day, inclusive of school time.

 

Children working in agriculture, in household-based establishments, in establishments with three or fewer workers, in apprenticeship training centers, and those working as domestic servants are subject to the Code of Obligations, which fails to provide a minimum age of employment. However, according to the Code of Obligations, children between the ages of 12 and 16 may not work at night and may work for no more than 8 hours a day.

 

(Section 6.d. Status of Child Labor Practices and Minimum Age for Employment, Turkey - Report of Human Rights Practices, 2001, U.S. Department of State.)

 

TURKEY - MINIMUM REMUNERATION

As of December 2001, the monthly gross minimum wage rates were approximately $124 (168 million TRL) for workers over age 16, and $106 (143 million TRL) for workers under 16. The national minimum wage does not provide a decent standard of living for a worker and family. It is difficult for a single worker, and impossible for a family, to live on the minimum wage without support from other sources. However, most workers earn considerably more than the minimum wage.

 

The Ministry of Labor is obliged legally to set minimum wages at least every 2 years through a minimum wage board, a tripartite government-industry-union body called the Minimum Wage Commission--which historically it had done annually. Public workers who are part of collective labor agreements also received an inflation-indexed increase and a 5 percent prosperity rate increase.

 

(Section 6.e. Acceptable Conditions of Work, Turkey - Report of Human Rights Practices, 2001, U.S. Department of State.)

 

TURKEY - REMUNERATION

ERI's Geographic and Salary Assessors are recommended sources for international remuneration covering 189 countries.

 

TURKEY - REPORT OF HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES (2001, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE)

Section 6 Worker Rights

 

a.  The Right of Association

 

Workers, including civil servants with the exception of police and military personnel, have the right under the Constitution to associate freely and form representative unions. The Constitution stipulates that no one shall be compelled to become, remain a member of, or withdraw from a labor union. In June Parliament passed a Law on the Union Rights for Public Servants, which permits the formation of unions for the first time since 1971. The law states that unions and confederations may be founded without prior authorization based on a petition to the governor of the province of the prospective union's headquarters. Unions are independent of the Government and political parties. However, there are some limits to the right of association. Unions must obtain official permission to hold meetings or rallies and must allow police to attend their conventions and record the proceedings. A constitutional amendment passed in October removed the requirement that candidates for union office must have worked previously in the industry for 10 years; the amendment took effect immediately. Prosecutors may ask labor courts to order a trade union or confederation to suspend its activities or to go into liquidation for serious infractions, based on alleged violation of specific legal norms; however, the Government may not dissolve a union summarily.

 

Just over 13 percent of the total civilian labor force (15 years of age and above) are unionized. The labor force numbers approximately 24 million, with approximately 35 percent employed in agriculture. There are four confederations of labor unions:  The Turkish Confederation of Workers Unions (Turk-Is); the Confederation of Turkish Real Trade Unions (Hak-Is); the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DISK); and the National Confederation (Misk). There also are 3 public employees unions and 27 independent unions. Unions and their officers have a statutory right to express their views on issues directly affecting members' economic and social interests. The Constitution prohibits unions and confederations from being involved in activity against the basic democratic principles of the country. Unions cannot give financial assistance or receive financial assistance from public authorities and political parties; unions also cannot be founders of political parties, use the name or emblem of a political party, or be involved in commercial activity.

 

Another constitutional amendment passed in October, which narrowed the scope of possible restrictions on the formation of unions, and another amendment made the State responsible for protecting the unemployed; however, no concrete steps towards implementing the legislation had been taken by year's end. The existing law provides for the establishment of trade unions and establishes rights and procedures for organizing unions.

 

The constitutional right to strike is restricted. For example, the Constitution does not permit strikes by civil servants, workers engaged in the protection of life and property, and those in the mining and petroleum industries, sanitation services, national defense, and education. The right to strike is suspended for the first 10 years of a company's operations in the nine free trade zones (see Section 6.b.).

 

Collective bargaining is required before a strike. The law specifies the steps that a union must take before it may strike or before an employer may engage in a lockout; nonbinding mediation is the last of those steps. A party that fails to comply with these steps forfeits its rights. Unions are forbidden to engage in secondary (solidarity), political, or general strikes, or in slowdowns. The employer may respond to a strike with a lockout but is prohibited from hiring strikebreakers or using administrative personnel to perform jobs normally done by strikers. The law governing collective bargaining, strikes, and lockouts, prohibits the employer from terminating workers who encourage or participate in a legal strike. In sectors in which strikes are prohibited, disputes are resolved through binding arbitration.

 

The Government has the statutory power under the law to suspend strikes for 60 days for reasons of national security or public health and safety. Unions may petition the Council of State to lift such a suspension. If this appeal fails, and the parties and mediators fail to resolve the dispute, the strike is subject to compulsory arbitration at the end of the 60-day period. The International Labor Organization's (ILO) Committee of Experts and the Committee on the Application of Standards regard the Government's application of the law as too broad, and they have called on the Government to limit recourse to compulsory arbitration to essential services in the strict sense of the term. The Government asserts that the law does not contradict the Committees' principles.

 

According to the Labor Ministry, during the year, there were 4 strikes in the public sector involving 737 workers and 30 strikes in the private sector involving 9,174 workers. There were no lockouts in the private or public sectors. Some labor union members faced government limits on freedom of speech and assembly (see Sections 2.a. and 2.b.), while some civil service organizations continued to demonstrate for the right to strike and for higher salaries.

 

With government approval, unions may and do form confederations and join international labor bodies, as long as these organizations are not hostile to the country or to freedom of religion or belief. Turk-is, Hak-Is, and DISK are affiliated  with the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU).

 

b.  The Right to Organize and Bargain Collectively

 

All industrial workers have the right to organize and bargain collectively, and most industrial and some public sector agricultural workers are organized. Civil servants also have the right to organize and engage in collective bargaining. However, there were limits on this right. The law requires that, in order to become a bargaining agent, a union must represent 51 percent of the employees at a given work site, and 10 percent of all the workers in that particular industry. This barrier has the effect of favoring established unions, particularly those affiliated with Turk-Is, the confederation that represents nearly 73 percent of organized labor. The Ministry of Labor reportedly manipulated membership figures to prevent unions from acquiring bargaining rights or to rescind such rights. The ICFTU reports that, as a result of the law, workers in many sectors of economic activity are not covered by a collective agreement.

 

The ILO has called on the Government to rescind the 10 percent rule, stating that it violates ILO Convention 98 on the Rights to Organize and Collective Bargaining. However, both Turk-Is and the Turkish employers' organization favor retention of the 10 percent rule, since each confederation has an established membership area. The Government has taken no action to amend the 10 percent rule.

 

The ILO has urged the Government to take the necessary measures to ensure that workers have effective protection against antiunion discrimination. The law on trade unions stipulates that an employer may not dismiss a labor union representative without rightful cause. The union member may appeal such a dismissal to the courts, and if the ruling is in the union member's favor, the employer must reinstate him and pay all back benefits and salary. These laws generally are applied in practice. However, private sector employers continued to try to eliminate unions. During the year, as a result of the privatization of 61 entities in 7 sectors, 1,384 workers were laid off.

 

The law prohibits antiunion discrimination and the Constitution prohibits pressuring a worker into becoming or refusing to become a union member; however, such discrimination occurred occasionally in practice. Some violence against union members continued during the year.

 

The continuing state of emergency in the southeast has resulted in restrictions on labor organizations in the four provinces under the state of emergency (see Section 1.d.). Dozens of unionists were kept out of the southeast during the year. In February a representative of the teacher's union told the media that 36 union members had been re-assigned out of the state of emergency region.

 

A law enacted in 1984 provides for the establishment of free trade/export processing zones, which are intended to attract domestic and particularly foreign investment, and to promote international trade. There are nine such zones operating in Mersin, Antalya, the Aegean region, Trabzon, Istanbul (two), Eastern Anatolia, Mardin, and Rize. Union organizing and collective bargaining are permitted in the zones; however, the right to strike is suspended for the first 10 years of operation of a particular business in the zone. In the meantime, labor disputes that cannot be settled by the parties are subject to compulsory arbitration. Workers inside the zones are paid in foreign exchange rather than in Turkish currency, giving them some protection against inflation.

 

c.  Prohibition of Forced or Compulsory Labor

 

The Constitution and statutes prohibit forced or compulsory labor; however, trafficking in women was a problem (see Section 6.f.).

 

The Constitution prohibits forced or compulsory labor by children; however, trafficking in girls was a problem (see Section 6.f.).

 

d.  Status of Child Labor Practices and Minimum Age for Employment

 

The Constitution and labor laws forbid the full-time employment of children younger than age 15, with the exception of those 13 or 14 years of age who may engage in light, part-time work if enrolled in school or vocational training. The Constitution also states that "no one shall be required to perform work unsuited to his/her age, sex, and capacity."  With this article and related laws, the Government undertakes to protect children from work unsuited to their age and capacity, such as underground mining, and from working at night. According to the Labor Law, children who attend school can work no more than 71/2 hours a day, inclusive of school time. The Ministry of Labor effectively enforces these laws only in large-scale industrial and service sector enterprises. Children working in agriculture, in household-based establishments, in establishments with three or fewer workers, in apprenticeship training centers, and those working as domestic servants are subject to the Code of Obligations, which fails to provide a minimum age of employment. However, according to the Code of Obligations, children between the ages of 12 and 16 may not work at night and may work for no more than 8 hours a day.

 

Child labor is widespread. According to a 2000 U.N. Children's Fund report, 1.07 million children between the ages of 6 and 14, and 2.4 million children between the ages of 15 and 17 are in the labor force. This represents approximately six percent of all children aged 6 to 14, and 60 percent of those aged 15 to 17. According to figures released by the State Statistical Institute in December, there are 12,670,000 children between the ages of 6 and 12 who should be enrolled in school; however, only 10,633,000 children attended school on a regular basis. Of the 1,434,000 children who did not attend school, 768,000 children between the ages of 6 and 12 were employed. The State Statistical Institute reported that between 1994-99 the number of children who attended school increased and the number of children who were employed decreased. According to the latest statistics provided in an October 1999 State Statistics Institute report, 961,000 children worked in family businesses and did not receive wages, 257,000 were seasonal workers, and 387,000 were wage earners. Approximately 1.1 million of the working children are boys. Child labor is used most often in small-sized enterprises. According to a study on child labor conducted by Hacettepe University in August, 79.4 percent of children who were employed live in rural areas and 92.6 percent of those children were engaged in the agricultural sector. Among children employed in urban centers, 40.2 percent were employed in industry, 22.4 percent in commerce, and 25.8 percent in the services sector.

 

In practice many children work because families need the supplementary income. An informal system provides work for young boys at low wages, for example, in auto repair shops. Girls rarely are seen working in public, but many are kept out of school to work in handicrafts, particularly in rural areas. The bulk of child labor occurs in rural areas and often is associated with traditional family economic activity, such as farming or animal husbandry. It is common for entire families to work together to bring in the harvest.

 

The gradual elimination of child labor is a national priority. The seventh 5-year development plan created during the year committed the Government to enact legislation to restrict further child labor and to adopt legislation to conform to relevant international conventions. The Government recognizes the serious problem of child labor and works with the ILO to document its extent and to determine solutions. The Ministry of Labor, the ILO'S International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC) government partner, actively has been combating child labor since 1992, when it established a child labor unit and trained Ministry of Labor inspectors specifically in child labor issues. In 1996 the Government and the ILO signed an agreement to extend IPEC until December 2001. Approximately 70 of the 700 field inspectors have been trained to handle child labor issues, while the total number of establishments falling within the jurisdiction of the Ministry is 4 million. Labor inspectors only cover areas that are defined in the labor laws. Many children are working in areas that are not covered by labor laws, such as agriculture or the informal economy and are therefore beyond the reach of the inspectorate.

 

Small enterprises prefer child labor because it is cheaper and provides practical training for the children, who subsequently are preferred for future employment in the same workplace. If children employed in these businesses are registered with a Ministry of National Education training center, they go to the center once a week for training, and the centers are obliged by law to inspect their workplaces. There are 318 centers located in 80 cities; these centers provide apprenticeship training in 86 occupations. Only 22.8 percent of working children take advantage of these schools.

 

On August 2, the Government ratified ILO Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labor. The Constitution prohibits compulsory labor, including that performed by children; however, trafficking in girls was a problem (see Sections 6.c. and 6.f.).

 

e.  Acceptable Conditions of work

 

The Ministry of Labor is obliged legally to set minimum wages at least every 2 years through a minimum wage board, a tripartite government-industry-union body called the Minimum Wage Commission--which historically it had done annually. Public workers who are part of collective labor agreements also received an inflation-indexed increase and a 5 percent prosperity rate increase. As of December 2001, the monthly gross minimum wage rates were approximately $124 (168 million TL) for workers over age 16, and $106 (143 million TL) for workers under 16. The national minimum wage does not provide a decent standard of living for a worker and family. It is difficult for a single worker, and impossible for a family, to live on the minimum wage without support from other sources. However, most workers earn considerably more than the minimum wage. According to the results of a 2000 survey conducted by the Public Workers' Labor Union, a four-member family requires $396 (534 million TL) per month to live above the poverty line. Workers covered by the labor law, who constitute approximately one-third of the total labor force, also receive a hot meal or a daily food allowance and other fringe benefits that, according to the Turkish Employers' Association, make basic wages alone account for only approximately 37.3 percent of total compensation.

 

The labor law sets a 45-hour workweek, although most unions have bargained for fewer hours. The law prescribes a weekly rest day and limits the number of overtime hours to 3 per day, for up to 90 days in a year. The Labor Inspectorate of the Ministry of Labor effectively enforces wage and hour provisions in the unionized industrial, service, and government sectors, which cover approximately 12 percent of workers.

 

The law mandates occupational health and safety regulations, but in practice the Government does not carry out effective inspection and enforcement programs. The law allows for the shutdown of an operation if a five-person committee, which includes safety inspectors, employee, and employer representatives, determines that the operation endangers workers' lives. In practice financial constraints, limited safety awareness, carelessness, and fatalistic attitudes result in scant attention to occupational safety and health by workers and employers alike. The law sets out procedures under which workers may remove themselves from hazardous conditions without risking loss of employment; for example, workers may issue a warning, resign, or demand compensation.

 

f.  Trafficking in Persons

 

There is no specific law prohibiting trafficking, although other laws may be used to prosecute traffickers; however, trafficking in women and girls for prostitution was a serious problem. The country is a transit country and a destination country for victims of trafficking; reportedly there is almost no trafficking of Turkish women and girls out of the country. There are no statistics on the number of trafficking victims. There are allegations that police allow operation of informal brothels in Instanbul and may also be bribed by traffickers at ports of entry.

 

The Government deals with the problem of trafficking in persons through laws relevant to organized crime, prostitution and illegal immigration. The Ministries of Justice and the Interior are responsible for the problem, and the police, particularly the immigration and organized crime authorities, enforce antitrafficking laws. The Ministry of the Interior's organized crime department is primarily responsible for combating trafficking. According to press reports, there was an increase in police raids on brothels during the second half of the year. In August the Ministry of Interior issued a circular to all provincial police chiefs, calling on them to combat those who aid and abet prostitution.

 

The Government does not provide any formal protection, aid, or education to victims of trafficking, and does not allocated any funding to victims. Victims are not encouraged to file civil suits or seek legal action against their traffickers. There are nine domestic violence shelters in Turkey; non-Turkish citizens in theory may use these shelters, but they are unlikely to know how to access them.

 

TURKEY - SOCIAL SECURITY

Social Security Office of International Programs:

 

http://www.ssa.gov/SSA_Home.html

 

TURKEY - STANDARD WORKWEEK

The labor law sets a 45-hour workweek, although most unions have bargained for fewer hours. The law prescribes a weekly rest day and limits the number of overtime hours to 3 per day, for up to 90 days in a year.

 

(Section 6.e. Acceptable Conditions of Work, Turkey - Report of Human Rights Practices, 2001, U.S. Department of State.)