Low-Wage Work in Germany

Low-Wage Work in Germany
Author: Gerhard Bosch
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Total Pages: 344
Release: 2008-04-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780871540621

In recent years, the German government has intentionally expanded the low-wage work sector in an effort to reduce exceptionally high levels of unemployment. As a result, the share of the German workforce employed in low-paying jobs now rivals that of the United States. Low Wage Work in Germany examines both the federal policies and changing economic conditions that have driven this increase in low-wage work. The new "mini-job" reflects the federal government's attempt to make certain low-paying jobs attractive to both employers and employees. Employers pay a low flat rate for benefits, and employees, who work a limited number of hours per week, are exempt from social security and tax contributions. Other factors, including slow economic growth, a declining collective bargaining system, and the influx of foreign workers, also contribute to the growing incidence of low-wage work. Yet while both Germany and the United States have large shares of low-wage workers, German workers receive health insurance, four weeks of paid vacation, and generous old age support—benefits most low-wage workers in the United States can only dream of. The German experience offers an important opportunity to explore difficult trade-offs between unemployment and low-wage work. A Volume in the Russell Sage Foundation Case Studies of Job Quality in Advanced Economies

Work Sharing during the Great Recession

Work Sharing during the Great Recession
Author: Jon Carleton Messenger
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2013-01-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1782540881

'Work sharing' is a labour market instrument devised to distribute a reduced volume of work to the same (or similar) number of workers over a diminished period of working time in order to avoid redundancies. This fascinating and timely study presents the concept and history of work sharing and explores the complexities and trade-offs involved in its use as both a strategy for preserving jobs and a policy for increasing employment. The expert contributors examine the resurgence in the use of work sharing as a job preservation strategy via country case studies of work-sharing programmes implemented across the globe during the Great Recession of 20082009. These studies clearly illustrate that work sharing has been successful as a crisis-response measure in a number of countries. Lessons learned and their implications are presented alongside prescriptions on how to design permanent work-sharing policies that would provide appropriate incentives to generate positive effects for employment and promote a sustainable and job-rich economic recovery. This enlightening book will prove invaluable to academics, researchers, students and policymakers in the fields of labour economics, public sector economics and social policy.

Has Work-sharing Worked in Germany?

Has Work-sharing Worked in Germany?
Author: Jennifer Hunt
Publisher:
Total Pages: 56
Release: 1997
Genre: Job sharing
ISBN:

Using both individual data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and data on 201 manufacturing industries for 1984-1989, examines whether employment rises when hours per worker are reduced.

Working Time

Working Time
Author: Deborah M. Figart
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2013-01-11
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1134585519

Working time is a crucial issue for both research and public policy. This book presents the first comprehensive analysis of both paid and unpaid work time, integrating a unique discussion of overwork, underwork, shortening of the working week, and flexible work practices. Time at work is affected by a complex web of evolving culture and social relations, as well as market, technological, and macroeconomic forces, and institutions such as collective bargaining and government policy. Using a variety of new data sources, the authors review the latest trends on working time in numerous countries.

Developments in German Industrial Relations

Developments in German Industrial Relations
Author: Gerd Grözinger
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2016-05-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1443893110

This book presents a review of the last twenty years of research in German industrial relations. Divided into three parts, it begins by exploring the major developments in this field of research. It then describes the academic field of industrial relations in Germany from different perspectives, looking back on twenty years of “Industrielle Beziehungen” – the German Journal of Industrial Relations. This is rounded off by an analysis of the changes in the real world of the German model and its major institutions, namely the DGB trade unions and co-determination on the establishment-level. In addition, the book discusses the contributions of neighbouring disciplines, particularly human resource management, economics, and labour law. As the German model and its developments are interesting not only for researchers in industrial relations, but also for practitioners in business and administration, this volume addresses both groups of readers.

Turkish Germans in the Federal Republic of Germany

Turkish Germans in the Federal Republic of Germany
Author: Sarah Thomsen Vierra
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2018-10-25
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1108427308

Provides a rich examination of how Turkish immigrants and their children created spaces of belonging in West German society.

Competition Law and Economic Inequality

Competition Law and Economic Inequality
Author: Jan Broulík
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2022-12-15
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1509959246

The gap between the rich and poor is widening across the globe. This book explores whether this major societal challenge of our time can be addressed by the means of competition law. The primary goal of today's competition law is to ensure that market power does not lead to an inefficient production of goods and services. Nevertheless, even such efficiency-oriented curbing of market power may arguably contribute to the reduction of differences in how much people own and earn. Furthermore, many competition law regimes do take into account distributive considerations too. The chapters investigate the relationship between competition law and economic (in)equality from philosophical, historical, and economic perspectives. Their inquiries concern the conceptual foundations of competition law and doctrinal frameworks of individual jurisdictions, as well as specific problems and markets. As such, the book provides a novel and comprehensive overview of whether and how competition law can contribute to more equality in both developed and developing countries. The book is a must-read for researchers, public officials, judges, and practitioners within the competition law community. It will also appeal to anyone more broadly interested in issues of inequality and economic policy.

Demand for Labor

Demand for Labor
Author: Daniel S. Hamermesh
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 462
Release: 2017
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0198791372

The book collects articles published by Daniel Hamermesh between 1969 and 2013 dealing with the general topic of the demand for labor. The first section presents empirical studies of basic issues in labor demand, including the extent to which different types of labor are substitutes, how firms' and workers' investments affect labor turnover, and how costs of adjusting employment affect the dynamics of employment and patterns of labor turnover. The second section examines the impacts of various labor-market policies, including minimum wages, penalty pay for using overtime hours or hours worked on weekends or nights, severance pay for displaced workers, and payroll taxes to finance unemployment insurance benefits. The final section deals with general questions of discrimination by employers along various dimensions, including looks, gender and ethnicity, in all cases focusing on the process of discrimination and the behavior that results. Throughout the focus is on the development of theoretically-based hypotheses and testing them using the most appropriate data, often data collected uniquely for the particular project.

Constructing Unemployment

Constructing Unemployment
Author: Phineas Baxandall
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2017-11-28
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 135116130X

As the longest economic boom in history has given way to leaner times, unemployment has re-emerged as a major issue. This theoretically and empirically sophisticated book examines how unemployment takes on widely different political meanings and explores the ways in which governments act to change their own accountability for unemployment. It contributes to the comparative political economy literature that analyzes political responses to economic problems. Baxandall reverses a conventional application of comparative research by using an Eastern European case to reveal political dynamics that are mirrored in the West - as demonstrated with American and Western European cases. Using interviews and previously unexplored archives to consider a dramatic transformation in the meaning of unemployment in Hungary, he demonstrates how the politics of economic change depend crucially on the political re-crafting of economic categories.