Sector-level strategies against precarious employment in Germany: Evidence from construction, commercial cleaning, hospitals and temporary agency work (original) (raw)
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Trade union responses to precarious employment in Germany
2011
Since the mid-1980s Germany saw a continuing increase of precarious employment which now amounts to about one third of the total labour force. Considering the negative social side-effects of this development, the voices which call for a re-regulation of the labour market have become more prominent in recent years. The study analyses strategic responses of German trade unions to the
Trade union responses to precarious work in seven European countries
P recarious employment is a major concern today in Europe's labour markets. In recent years, the percentage of employees working under precarious conditions has increased across the continent, accompanied by processes of segmentation and exclusion. Precarious employment refers to employment that combines some of the following characteristics: low levels of income and income security, low job and employment security, bad working conditions, limited access to training, limited social security rights and/or limited voice. Precarious employment affects not only the working situation of the person in such employment but also his or her household through, for example, deficient and volatile income, problems in accessing loans or high levels of insecurity. In very general terms, the growth of precarious employment is associated with several broad developments, including the rise of the service sector and the decline of industrial employment, changes in technology and work organization, changes in corporate governance and employers' strategies, declining trade union power, ongoing drives towards privatization and marketization and individualization. More specifically, a number of labour market developments have led to increased precarious employment. Recent studies indicate a polarization trend in the labour market of many European countries, following the growth in employment in both the highest-skilled and higher-quality (professional and managerial) and lowest-skilled and lowest-quality (personal services) occupations, and with declining employment in the middle of the distribution (manufacturing and routine office jobs) (Goos, Manning and Salomons, 2009; Fernandez-Macias and Hurley, 2008). Most recently, as a result of the crisis this polarization trend has increased with a growing number of European Union (EU) countries experiencing a downgrading of the employment structure through job destruction in the higher sections of the labour market, no growth in the middle, and a growth or relatively minor decline of jobs in the lower sections (European Commission, 2011). There is also a marked rise in various types of atypical, often flexible jobs, including fixed-term contracts, temporary agency work, (dependent) self-employment, project work, and (marginal) part-time contracts (Eichhorst, Feil and Marx, 2010). Such jobs, which first appeared in an expanding service sector, come with lower levels of job security, frequently provide only limited access to social security, may suffer from low rates of pay and worse working conditions, and generally offer only limited training opportunities (ibid.). As a result, work is no longer a guarantee against poverty, considering that in 2009, in-work poverty amounted to 8.5 per cent of the employed in the European Union (Frazer, Gutiérrez and Peña-Casas, 2011). Finally, the quality of standard jobs is also under pressure in certain sectors, in particular in the service sectors that require little education and in the lower end of manufacturing, resulting in low wages and/or very high levels of flexibility. As a result of these developments, even though more people are in employment today than 20 or 30 years ago, for many workers the chances of Contents Contents
Trade union strategies against precarious work: Common trends and sectoral divergence in the EU
European Journal of Industrial Relations
We present comparative research on precarious work and trade union strategies in three sectors (construction, industrial cleaning, temporary agency work) across seven European countries. Specific sectors have a profile of precarious work that is remarkably similar across countries, originating from similar employer strategies and work organizations. This results in unions facing comparable challenges concerning precarious work at sectoral level and developing comparable sectoral strategies to combat precarious work. The success of these strategies depends to a large extent on the available power resources. Between sectors within single countries, we observe some similarities but also very substantial differences in their institutional configuration and in actors’ constellations, power resources and repertoires of action. National institutional contexts seem much less significant than often assumed.
Protective Gaps and the Role of Social Dialogue in Germany Reducing Precarious Work
According to the basic understanding adopted here, 'precariousness' is not limited to non-standard forms of employment such as mini-jobs, temporary agency work or fixed-term employment. Instead, our study distinguishes between four different types of 'protective gaps' (employment rights; social protection and integration; representation; and enforcement) and investigates the extent to which these gaps affect both employees in a standard employment relationship and in different types of non-standard or ‚atypical' employment. Key findings are summarized below. They reveal that atypical employees are disproportionately affected by protective gaps; but employees on regular jobs have not been spared either.
The research reports, 2016
PROJECT GOALS This project investigated the role of industrial relations in addressing precarious work. It focused on the initiatives and responses that trade unions and employers’ associations developed to deal with precarious work in Croatia, the Czech Republic (hereafter Czechia), Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia since 2008. In each country, the study analysed developments in five sectors, namely public healthcare, the metal industry, construction, retail and temporary agency work (TAW). The project used a qualitative approach to examine the dimensions of precarious employment, including low pay, irregular working hours, low job security and limited representation of workers’ rights. DUAL LABOUR MARKETS Apart from an increase in the share of non-standard work contracts since 2008, findings suggest that all forms of employment were exposed to more precarious conditions following various degrees of labour market deregulation across the 10 countries. In a context of weak law enforcement and decreasing unions’ role and influence, employers were able to use (and sometimes abuse) their enlarged prerogatives to increase the workload, the use of irregular working time and sometimes, to reduce the income of workers on all types of contracts. Still, workers in the informal market and dependent self-employed have the most precarious working conditions across the countries. These vulnerable groups are most prevalent in the construction and the retail sectors, often doing work for small domestic firms. In contrast, large (often multinational) firms, particularly in the construction and metal sectors use more frequently outsourcing to reduce labour costs. The share of agency workers, fixed-term and part-time employees has risen across the countries but less than expected in some countries (e.g. Croatia and Romania) due to labour shortages associated with massive emigration and the fact that employers have sufficient leverage to demand employees on full-time open ended contracts to work irregular hours contingent on companies’ needs. RESPONSES OF SOCIAL PARTNERS TO PRECARIOUS EMPLOYMENT Social partners focused primarily on legal initiatives to regulate precarious work at the national level, while additional initiatives, such as collective bargaining were used at lower levels. Employers’ initiatives generally sought to deregulate the labour market and they have been quite successful, in most countries. Unions’ initiatives to improve precarious employment conditions through legislation often failed, which sometimes resulted in innovative or ‘recombined’ old and new strategies to fight against precarious work. In some countries, unions managed to organise the most vulnerable workers, such as self-employed and outsourced employees. Nevertheless, unions’ strategies varied across countries from aiming to transform precarious work arrangements into standard employment in Slovenia to supporting the economic rationale of precarious work forms in Latvia. POLICY IMPLICATIONS Periods of crisis throw new light on the role of the social partners. The labour market deregulation has shifted the initiative in industrial relations from unions and employers’ associations to individual employers by widening their prerogatives to set employment conditions, which in turn, increased the dualization of the labour markets. Furthermore, there is evidence of precarious work practices being exported by multinationals across their subsidiaries, prompting convergence of management practices. Trade unions need to be aware of the international dimension of precarious work, as they could also use their international networks, including their positions in European Works Councils, to fight against spreading precarious work by multinationals and a ‘race to the bottom’ in labour standards. Nevertheless, social partners cannot fight against precarious work, unless governments guarantee, at least, the fundamental union rights and ensure the effective implementation of labour laws
What has been analysed in France mainly under the term "précarité de l'emploi" over the past 30 years was mostly dealt with differently in other countries (atypical, non-standard employment). Research on these issues dates back to the 1970s in sociology and institutional economics. More recently some political scientists have endeavoured to link up the labour market theme with developments in systems of social protection and they are talking about "dualism" and "dualization". Despite the constant intellectual investment put into the topic, it is striking that indicators for comparative measurement of the phenomenon have remained rather unsophisticated, as the basic opposition between what Eurostat names "temporary contracts" and "open-ended contracts". On the other hand, because of the spreading of the effects of work and employment flexibilisation into new countries, new categories are appearing since the early 2000s (Prekariat,...
The Challenge of Precarious Work in the 21st Century
Business and Economics Journal, 2021
Precarious work-work that is insecure and uncertain, often low-paying, and in which the risks of work are shifted from employers and the government to individual workers has emerged as a central challenge for workers, organizations, and government in the 21st century. This essay, which is based on my recent book, Precarious Lives (2018), summarizes the recent rise and consequences of precarious work in six rich democracies: Denmark, Germany, Japan, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. We discuss how differences in these countries’ labor market institutions and policies (such as unions and collective bargaining, active labor market policies and employment protections) and social welfare policies (such unemployment insurance and the generosity of other welfare benefits) shaped peoples’ experiences of job and economic insecurity, transitions to adulthood, and subjective well-being. We also outline the elements of a new political and social contract that is needed to address...