Transcript PowerPoint presentation

« The
political economy of
flexicurity »
Peter Auer, Senior Fellow, IILS, ILO
Visiting fellow WOS/USYD
Negotiating labour market security
Peter Auer/ILO/2009
Griffith University, July 28,2009
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Discussion points
Flexicurity: what is it?
Does it work?
Is it accepted?
Any relevance for Australia?
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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Flexicurity: what is it?
Commenting the film
Response to globalization and flexibilization
Core I: stable jobs
Core II: strong labour market institutions
for ensuring good transitions
Core III: social dialogue and CB
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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Flexicurity: what is it?
Transforming the trade-off between flexibility
and security into a complementarity
from employment protection to labour market
protection
life cycle professional trajectories and labour
market risks
Reform labour laws carefully
Building/enhancing labour market policies and
institutions (e.g. PES, (A)LMPs including training
and education)
Using the social dialogue and collective bargaining
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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From Job-to labour market security
Time
Job security*
*
employment security**
labour market security***
Protection of a job/task in a setting of employment security
** Protection of employment within single firms but not on any particular job
*** Protection of employment in several firms combined with social protection
(LM policy, social rights) for protecting transitions=flexicurity
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Does it work?Clustering flexicurity countries
clustering flexicurity
1.5
BE
0.5
Security
DK
NL
SE
1.0
AT
FR
DE
FI
0.0
EL
-0.5
IT
PT
ES
-1.0
UK
IE
-1.5
-2.0
-1.5
-1.0
-0.5
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
Flexibility
Clustering based on 8 variables that are used as proxies for flexibility and security
Flexibility: internal: working time flexibility and modern work organization; external:
average employment tenure, EPL (employment protection legislation) for regular and
temporary jobs. Security: LMP expenditure for 1% of unemployed, expenditure on
social protection and collective bargaining coverage. (z-score clustering with equal
weight for each indicator). Sources: European Foundation, OECD, ILO, Eurostat .
Values:average 2000-2006 when available., otherwise last available: e.g. EPL 2003)
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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Does it work? Flexicurity countries‘ performance compared
Values avg. 2000-2006
FS (5)
Others (10)
Difference % points
Employment Rate 15-64
(ER)
72.0
63,1
+8,9
Full Time Equivalent
(FTER) 15-64
64,2
58,2
+6,0
Women ER
66,9
53,8
+13,1
Women FTE
55,6
46,9
+8,7
Unemployment rate
5,4
7,2
-1,8
Productivity/Hour in
Euros
29,4 Eu
27,4 EU
+2,0 Eu
Productivity/Hour
(2000=100)
110,3
107,6
+2,7
Gini coefficient
25,1
30,6
-5,5
Social protection
effectiveness
(before and after social
14,5
8,4
+6,1
Labour Market Policy
0,63
0,28
+0,35
transfer poverty reduction)
(expenditure in % of GDP for
1% of unemployment)
And how do they manage the crisis? Unemployment May 2009 (5) 6,0 (10) 8,8// economic
growth q4 2008/ q1 2009 : (5) -1,8 (10) -2,0
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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Is it accepted? Critical and supporting voices:
Flexicurity is an appealing concept because it offers a
way to restore a positive link between
competitiveness and social protection. Globalisation
and technological progress require responsiveness to
deliver their full benefits, and hence finding new
ways to combine social protection and economic
flexibility is fundamental to more and higherproductivity jobs. (M. Stocker, advisor to Business Europe, in Euro
Activ, September 2007)
To prevent « flexicurity » to become
« flexploitation » the Commission should take
responsiblity for shaping a strong social dimension to
the internal market, guaranteeing worker’s rights and
worker’s security (John Monks, ETUC, interview at the EU’s Portuguese
presidency conference, Sep. 2007)
The real agenda hiding behind 'flexicurity' simply
seems to be the dismantling of job protection.... (R.
Janssen, from ETUC , Euro-Activ, September 2007).
Peter Aur/ ILO 2009
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Manifestation in front of Portuguese EUconference on Flexicurity October 2007 : … »the
government lies : Flexicurity=dismissals » « No development for Portugal with flexicurity »
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Critics of activation
French Communist party (PCF)
Postcard 50s
Peter Auer/ ILO 2009
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Political economy questions
Flexicurity seems to work with different degrees of
external flexibility and the „flexicurity countries“ in
the EU 15 have good economic, social and labour
market performance Why then opposition?
• Job/employment protection „red line“ for unions
• Financing of compensatory social protection difficult
under tight budgets
• LM policy often not positively evaluated
• Resistance to model transfer: no one size fits all and
path dependency of reforms
• An anticipated compromise not in line with adverserial
settings/ low trust between the SPs
• Uncertain applicability in other than European welfare
state countries
• LM Context counts a lot
• EU Commission as policy driver faces low approuval rates
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Flexicurity with different employment tenure
Figure 1.1 Average Job Tenure in Years EU-15 for 1992 and 2005
14
1992
2005
12
10
8
EU 15 average: 1992 10,48
EMP/ANALYSIS
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Greece
Portugal
Belgium
France
Italy
Luxembourg
Netherlands
Sweden
Germany
Finland
Spain
Austria
0
Denmark
2
Ireland
4
United Kingdom
6
2005 10,74 (Japan 12 (2000) , USA 6,9 (2004)
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Any relevance for Australia?
Australia: major recent example of labour
market deregulation and reregulation: from
work-choices to fair work Australia
Difficult way back from Howard government
Reform, and interesting political economy
Vast exercise of social dialogue
New labour market institutions:
• Both on procedures and laws: CB, FWA, unfair dismissal
• And substantive policies, programmes and delivery
organisations: UI benefits and ALMP (training)
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Flexicurity debate is relevant for Australia
no way around a real dialogue and
participation resulting in good
procedures and substantive policies for
a socially embedded economy,
Which provides for labour market
security allowing individuals and firms
to adjust to the ups and downs of the
global economy and to find satisfying
personal professional trajectories in
performing economies.
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Peter Auer/ ILO 2009