The origins of the rise of precarious employment

Résumé du document

Today, manpower is the largest employer in the US. This fact highlights the penetration of temp agencies into job markets in most of the capitalist countries. These companies essentially provide temporary, often part-time and low paid jobs with low protections, job insecurity and few carrier evolutions for workers. The structure of job market has deeply evolved since the 1970s in the frame of a post-industrial economy to an economic framework based on neoliberalism, service economy and new employment relations. This paper will focus on the causes of the rise of precarious employment and will analyze the shift from Fordism economy to neoliberalim as a key issue in the rise of precarious employment.

Extraits

[...] All these causes led to consequently reduce precarious and contingent employment at this time to achieve a new employment standard defined by several criteria. Indeed the job standard which emerged at this time was characterized as full time and permanent employment with a single employer and in a single worksite represented by trade unions and framed by the welfare state. II) From Keynesianism and welfare state to neoliberalism The crisis in the 70's caused by the oil shock in 1973 deeply changed the job market in capitalist societies. [...]

[...] In the 90's, precarious and contingent employment's share among total jobs sharply increased driven by the development of temp agencies and the changes in the structure of the economy. Considered at first as a solution to economic slowdowns and a way to regain growth thanks to flexibility, precarious and contingent employment became a substantial and permanent part of job market. III) Globalisation and the New Economy In the 90's, economy went through an important mutation. A shift from good producing traditional economy model to an economy based on the provision of services occurred. [...]

[...] This transformation was a consequence of the development of information technologies and the decrease of transportation costs which reinforce the process of globalisation. As a consequence of these, new form of jobs emerged and other normal' forms of jobs increased such as correspondence works or jobs in small new firms, start-ups, in the context of the internet bubble. These employs did not offer a real protection for workers and small businesses requested a stronger flexibility than big companies. In addition to that, comparing to an industrial and manufacture-based economy, asset-based service businesses do not make easy for workers to unionise and to have a coherent representation able to fight for their interests because of the sprawl of jobs in various locations and the differences in each personal type of employment. [...]

[...] These two facts play a real role in the rise of precarious and contingent employment both in the domestic country and in the world. As a conclusion, capitalist logic and the research for profit are at the origins of precarious and contingent employment. Regulation and state intervention in social policies can reduce this trend by setting protection and enforcing laws to guaranty rights for the workers as in the period from the 40's to the 70's. Neoliberalism and the rise of the New Economy have destroy this model by promoting job flexibility and market deregulation and explain the new rise of precarious employment first in the 70's and then again in the 90's. [...]

[...] The origins of the rise of precarious employment The origins of the rise of precarious employment Today, Manpower is the largest employer in the USA. This fact highlights the penetration of temp agencies into job markets in most of capitalist countries. These companies essentially provide temporary, often part-time and low paid jobs with low protections, job insecurity and few carrier evolutions for workers. The structure of job market has deeply evolved since the 70's in the frame of a post-industrial economy to an economic framework based on neoliberalism, service economy and new employment relations. [...]