Wetting agent for textile pretreatment

The invention relates to a wetting agent for the pre-treatment of textiles, containing a mixture of ether carboxylic acids of the general formula (I) R-O-(CnH2nO)x-CH2COOM, in which R is a linear alkyl radical with between 8 and 22 C-atoms, M is hydrogen or a cation, n is 2 or 3 and x is a number between 4 and 18, and alkyoxylated fatty alcohols of the formula (II) R-O-(Cn-H2nO)x-H, in which R, n and x have the meanings assigned to them above. Said mixture is characterized in that the fatty alcohols of formula (II) contain at least 40 weight percent molecules in which the number of alkoxyl groups deviates by no more than +/- 1 alkoxyl group from the mean alkoxyl group content of the compounds of formula (II) and in that fatty alcohols of formula (II) are used to produce the ether carboxylic acids of formula (I).