The economic crisis and job quality in Europe: some worrying trends and worse may be to come

Janine Leschke

Andrew Watt

The economic crisis has had a dramatic and lasting impact on labour markets worldwide. The recent ILO Global Employment Trends report spelled out the damage wrought in terms of the declines in employment and consequent rise in unemployment: globally the employment-to-population ratio fell by one percentage point and unemployment rose by 27 million persons.

But what have been the impacts on the quality of work? We can shed some light on this for the 27 member countries of the European Union using a Job Quality Index (JQI) developed at the European Trade Union Institute. We first calculated the JQI based on 2005 data; see here for the findings. We have now repeated the analysis based on 2010 data; by comparing the two sets of results we can see how job quality has changed on various dimensions over the five-year period and draw some conclusions about the impact of the crisis. The full results will be available shortly as an ETUI Working Paper; here we provide Global Labour Column readers with a brief analysis of the key findings[1] .

Measuring job quality: key features of the ETUI’s JQI

Whether one perceives one’s job as being of high or low quality depends, obviously, on a mix of both subjective and objective factors. And the mix is complex: how can, for instance, a clean and safe working environment be weighed against, say, autonomy at work or the fact that one is working the ‘right’ number of hours? The interested reader will find here a detailed description of the methodology underlying the JQI, our attempt to systematise the numerous factors impacting on job quality. For the purposes of this column the following basic features need to be borne in mind.

T-Shirt Economics: Labour in the Imperialist World Economy

Tony Norfield

Everybody knows that workers are paid different wages in different countries. However, the scale of the divergence in wages can nevertheless be surprising: not just 10% or 20% different, but more like a factor of 2, 5, 10 or 20 between the richer countries and the poorer countries. Mainstream economic theory explains this – and justifies it – by arguing that workers in richer countries are more productive than in poorer ones, arguing that the former are more educated and skilled, working with higher levels of technology. Yet this explanation does not sit well with the reality that many manufacturing employees in poor countries are employed, directly or indirectly, by major corporations, and working with technology that is comparable to that in the richer countries.

An American manufacturing worker on some $34 per hour, including welfare and other benefits, may not feel rich, and he is certainly earning a tiny proportion of the salary of his managers and the CEO. Nevertheless, he is earning more than twice what a South Korean manufacturing worker earns, nearly five times the wages and benefits of a Polish worker, around 20 times that of a Chinese worker and an even bigger multiple of those for workers in India.[i] How can this be?

Wage Negotiations for the Public Service in Zimbabwe

Nyika Gwanoya

The civil workforce in Zimbabwe faces an uncertain future due to ongoing wage negotiations with the government which seem to be bearing no fruit[1]. At the forefront of the current negotiations is the Apex Council of public sector unions led by the Zimbabwe Teachers Association (Zimta) who are in negotiations with the Public Service ministry led by Lucia Matibenga. Zimta is part of the Apex council which is a bargaining body with three other civil servants’ unions namely, Teachers Union of Zimbabwe, Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe and the Public Service Association.

The majority of the civil servants in Zimbabwe are earning well below the poverty datum line with the lowest paid civil servant earning close to $180[2] a month. The unions in Zimbabwe who represent the civil servants are unhappy at the protracted negotiations which have borne few results. The offer by government is seen as very low and falls well short of their demands. The unions are demanding that the minimum wage for government workers should be $538 a month which is on par with the poverty datum line estimated to be $540 by the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ). However, the blanket offer by the government of $240 million would lead to an increase of the civil servants’ salaries by close to $90. Although this increment is above the inflation rates, it will be unable to cushion the employees against the rising cost of living given their already low salaries.

Trade Union Activists are in Jail in Turkey, but why?

Zeynep Ekin Aklar

Gaye Yilmaz

(written by  Zeynep Ekin Aklar with contribution from Gaye Yilmaz)

The repression of opposition movements, particularly trade unions, has been increasing in Turkey since 2008. Today more than 6000 people are in jail as a result of having different opinions from the Turkish government. More specifically, since the end of March 2012, more than 100 journalists and artists, 40 trade union activists, 1000 children, 600 students and academics and thousands of activitists from the Kurdish movement have been held in prison for months without trial. As recently as 25 June 2012, 71 Kurdish trade union members of the Confederation of Public Employees’ Trade Unions (KESK) were detained. For the first time since the 1980 military intervention, Mr. Lami Özgen, a leader of a trade union confederation was detained.

Europe’s lost Decade – Paths out of Stagnation

Hansjörg Herr

The Great Recession of 2008-2010 reflects an economic instability that had built up over the previous decades. Within the European Monetary Union (EMU), the crisis of the financial market-driven development model is overlaid by a largely homemade state debt crisis and an undefined integration goal. The western world, and more particularly Europe, is facing a lost decade.

The market radical globalisation project

The 1950s-60s may be counted among the best years of the young capitalist social order. This was because everyone could have a slice of progress. The dynamic consumer demand was based on a relatively well-balanced income distribution. Investment activity was high and stable, given the low level of economic uncertainty and the stable development of demand. Precarious employment relationships were just as rare as complicated financial market products or obscenely high managerial pay. The 1970s saw the start of a crisis that reflected an inability to adapt the prevailing economic model. The crisis led, notably in the UK and the US, to the election of conservative governments who embarked on a radical reshaping of the policy framework.