Most chapters of the book are based on findings of the three projects being realised during the 2013–2016 period by members of the Centre for Organisational and Human Resources Research – Institute for Social Sciences, Faculty of Social Sciences. The key thesis of the book suggests connection between growing share of workers in non-standard employment in Slovenian companies with the escalating competitive pressures at the common European market. A high flexibility of workers in standard employment is not sufficient for survival of the companies at the European market. Accordingly, companies are forced to escalate competitiveness by technology renewals and/or by using functional substitutes - small companies based on deprivation of theirs workers and/or on use of non-standard and precarious workers.
COBISS.SI-ID: 294261248
The chapter addresses the problem of trade union responses to the precarization of work in the retail sector in Estonia, Poland, and Slovenia. The retail sector is as an example of a low-paid sector, in which trade unions face similar challenges associated with high levels of non-standard employment. We ask two questions. First, what impact have sectoral characteristics, institutional factors, and trade union strategies had on patterns of precarious work in retail workplaces of three countries? Second, are new patterns of solidarity emerging in the retail sectors of these three countries following the economic downturn? Our analysis suggests that institutional differences influenced the forms and extent of precarious work. More generally, the chapter demonstrates how opportunities and constraints embedded in the institutional context have influenced union resources and responses to precarization. We conclude that unions’ associational power and institutional power are crucial for the institutions to function and bring gains for labour.
COBISS.SI-ID: 35549789
Understanding the causes of rising inequality is of concern in many countries. Using administrative data, we find that the share of inequality that is between workplaces is growing in 12 of 14 countries examined, and in no country has it fallen. Countries with declining employment protections see growth in both between- and within-workplace inequalities, but this impact is stronger for between-workplace inequalities. These results suggest that to reduce market income inequality requires policies that raise the bargaining power of lower-skilled workers. The widespread rise in between-workplace inequality additionally suggests policy responses that target the increasing market power of firms in concentrated markets as well as curb the ability of powerful firms to outsource low skill employment.
COBISS.SI-ID: 36658013