| Index of Volumes |
LABOUR
REVIEW
| VOLUME 140, NUMBER 4 | 2001/4 |
| CONTENTS |
|
The Occupational Wages around the World data file Richard B. FREEMAN and Remco H. OOSTENDORP The ILO's October Inquiry (OI), a worldwide annual survey of wages and hours of work, has been conducted since 1924. However, its potential for informing debate about the effects of globalization, labour market institutions and other factors on wage levels and wage inequality has been hampered by problems of inconsistent reporting, making comparisons difficult. The authors outline the technical problems involved and present their method for transforming the OI data for 1983-99 into a consistent file on pay in 161 occupations in over 150 countries. The resulting Occupational Wages around the World (OWW) file should interest all labour (and other) statisticians. Night work of women in industry: Standards and sensibility George P. POLITAKIS ILO standards that prohibit or restrict women's night work in industry were originally hailed as major advances for the protection of female workers. Today, however, these instruments are increasingly seen as obstacles to equality. Many states have denounced them in favour of protection for all night workers, irrespective of their sex. Yet the ILO's constituents remain deeply divided as to whether or not women need special "protection" outside of objective contingencies like maternity. To clarify the underlying issues and the challenge this poses to the ILO, Politakis draws on a survey of the law and practice of over 100 states. Devolving public employment services: Preliminary assessment of the Austrialian experiment Alfred M. DOCKERY and Thorsten STROMBACK The trend in OECD countries has been to devolve the delivery of active assistance programmes for the unemployed and make employment services markets more competitive. In order to contribute to the evidence on the effectiveness of different models, the authors assess the initial experience of Australia's radical experiment of contracting out, under the Job Network, almost all the services previously provided by the public employment service. They consider job-matching activities, job-search training, and intensive assistance for disadvantaged jobseekers, and conclude that, unless contracts are well specified and payments well structured, negative incentive effects will detract from social outcomes. PerspectivesThe future of work, employment and social protection (the Annecy Symposium, January 2001) What are the implications of the "social question" confronting the industrialized countries today? Of the changes affecting the world of work, which are those driven by the needs of production, and which are those dictated by the (im)balance of power between labour and capital? Is employment generally growing more precarious, or is the labour market becoming segmented? What social protection and regulations might be introduced to counter the new risks and uncertainties inherent in today's economic environment? This "Perspective" reports on the first in a series of symposiums organized by the ILO and France to seek answers to these questions. Books Index for 2001 ISSN 1564-913X |
For further information, please contact: International Labour Review, ILO, CH-1211 Geneva 22, Switzerland - at Tel: +41.22.799.7903 or Fax: +41.22.799.6117 or +41.22.798.8685 or E-mail: revue@ilo.org