Relied upon for the heavy lifting: can employment protection legislation reforms lead the EU out of the jobs crisis?

This article examines the current drive within the European Union to weaken employment protection legislation. It subjects the case for reform to critical scrutiny and argues that labour market deregulation and the erosion of employment and social protections are reducing workers' security while failing to stimulate economic recovery.     

The impact of (more) enlargement on the European Employment Strategy

The European Union (EU) aspires to be the most competitive, full employment economy in the world and has set a number of ambitious targets to be met by 2010 in order that it can achieve this goal. At the same time, it is pursuing an enlargement policy that will witness the accession of an increasing number of less developed nations. This article explores some of the tensions that exist between these two goals as these are manifest in labour market indicators and finds the likelihood of meeting the deadline set for success remote.     

Does economic globalization affect the level and volatility of labor demand by skill? New insights from the Tunisian manufacturing industries

The central aim of this paper is to assess the effects of economic globalization on the level and volatility of labor demand for different skill groups in Tunisia. Using a panel dataset covering six manufacturing industries between 1983 and 2009, three main findings are reported. First, exports and imports exert a positive impact only on the semi-skilled and skilled labor demand while foreign direct investment flows increase the demand for semi-skilled and unskilled workers. Second, the regional analysis suggests that exports to the European Union boost the demand for the semi-skilled and skilled labor. Imports from the rest of the world exert similar effects on the demand for these two categories of workers. It emerges also that imports from the European Union lead to a higher demand for skilled labor, which gives support to the validity of the skill-enhancing trade hypothesis in Tunisian industries. Finally, our findings suggest that both exports and imports rise the employment volatility associated with skilled workers. On the other hand, there is a weak evidence of increased employment volatility as a result of foreign direct investment flows.     

National versus supranational bank regulation: Gains and losses of joining a banking union

We ask how the structure of international banking affects the decision of a national regulator to join a banking union and to transfer regulatory powers to the supranational level. The focus is on bank supervision and bank resolution. A national regulator ignores possible gains or losses, which accrue to other jurisdictions if banks are internationally active. A supranational regulator takes these regulatory external effects into account. While supranational regulation improves total welfare, this is not necessarily the case for welfare in single countries. By analyzing the size and determinants of spillover effects we show how they constrain a country’s willingness to participate in a banking union. Our results may explain why some member states of the European Union currently hesitate to join the European Banking Union.     

Frontier-free Europe: a study of female migrants in the banking sector

Legislation on 'freedom of movement' guarantees the recognition of qualifications between countries of the European Union (EU), and is meant to provide migrants with access to employment in all member states. This paper reports on a study undertaken of EU migrant women in the banking sector in Britain, Germany and Spain. The discusses the experiences of migrants with regard to access to employment and positions abroad comparable to those held prior to migration. Migrants in this case experienced obstacles in the access to such employment. Although their experiences influenced by labour-market needs, findings suggest that the determining factors for barriers encountered were differences in the education and training cultures of countries pre- and post-migration, and the values and attitudes attached to these in of expectations by employers and migrants themselves.     

The future of the CAP? Problems and Proposals

The CAP has been both a corner-stone and stumbling-block for the European Union. Agenda 2000 is proclaimed by the European Commission as a radical change in the policy to meet the challenges of the new millennium. However, this Agenda still does not resolve the fundamental problems facing the policy. It is time for some genuine leadership to be displayed through the development of a serious and relevant strategy of reform for one of the founding policies of the Union.     

Central Asia's transport cost burden and its impact on trade

This paper examines the role of transportation costs in causing the countries of Central Asia to generate far less trade with the European Union (EU) than their relative location would suggest. Based on data collected from transport professionals, it detects a sharp increase in the transportation costs and time at Warsaw, moving east from the EU towards the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). In the case of Central Asia, border-crossing problems, low traded volumes and trade imbalance, inter alia, seem to be major explanations of the unexpected low trade level between Central Asia and the EU.     

The impact of the European social fund on youth education and employment

The effectiveness of the European Union's Cohesion Policy in reducing regional socio-economic gaps remains an open empirical issue, while evidence as to how the policy is affected by specific territorial factors and which social groups benefit most from it remains sparse. This article seeks to address this gap by disentangling the impact of the European Social Fund (ESF) on youth education and employment prospects. Drawing on macro-level data for the European NUTS-2 regions, we assess the impact that this fund has on different education-specific youth population shares and employment rates. In the case of education, we find that the receipt of funding is associated with a human capital polarization of regional populations. Specifically, we identify a positive impact of the ESF on population shares with lower-secondary and tertiary education, and a simultaneous negative impact on the share of those with upper-secondary education. In the case of employment, we find a positive response for youth of all education levels. A heterogeneity analysis indicates that both the education and employment responses of the youth population to the receipt of the ESF are strongly influenced by local specialization in high-skilled activities.     

Prospects for an ordoliberal reform of the European Union

This article discusses the prospects for an ordoliberal reform of the European Union in order to tackle its multiple crises. It shows what an ordoliberal European Union would have to look like and examines the constraints its implementation faces. Three reasons are identified that make an ordoliberal reform of the EU at present unlikely. First, in the EU's most powerful member state, Germany, where ordoliberalism has its origins, economic policy adheres increasingly less to this strain of economic thinking. Second, given the primacy of European integration in domestic politics, Germany values European unity higher than economic principles. Third, once Brexit is complete Germany will lack influential allies for an ordoliberal reshaping of the EU.     

Equality and diversity in the public services: moving forward on lesbian,gay and bisexual equality?

A key change for lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people in the European Union has been the prohibition by the Employment Equality Directive (2000) of discrimination in employment on grounds of sexual orientation. This article focuses on the UK, which in 2003 introduced legislation making it unlawful to discriminate on these grounds. It explores the factors encouraging ‘good practice’ in sexual orientation equality work. It considers progress within the public services that have ‘pioneered’ sexual orientation equalities work, drawing on the views of LGB employees, management and trade union stakeholders. The recent legislation is considered to have provided a major impetus for change; however, an emerging ‘business case’ within the public service modernisation agenda is considered to have provided both opportunities and barriers to progress. A challenge for HR practitioners is getting organisational commitment to sexual orientation work, which is still perceived within organisations as a ‘sensitive’ area.     

The ups and downs of European gender equality policy

In 2003, equal opportunities policy in the European Union suffered both ups and downs. New opportunities came in the guise of the hotly contested new directive on gender equality outside the field of employment, in the invitation to present the first of an annual report on equality between women and men to the Spring Council, in the consolidation of gender mainstreaming within the second round of the National Action Plans on social inclusion and in the new commitments to ‘substantial reductions by 2010’ in gender gaps in employment, unemployment and pay that were included in the new employment guidelines in 2003. These new guidelines presented, however, a major challenge to gender equality as the new phase of the European Employment Strategy dispensed with the four pillars, and therefore the equal opportunities pillar. Instead gender equality became just one of 10 new guidelines. In December the launch of the Employment Taskforce report appeared to push employment policy back more to a ‘full employment with flexibility’ approach and away from concerns with job quality. The focus was therefore more on the integration of women into employment rather than on closing the equality gap.     

Consolidating segmentation: post‐Socialist employment relations in Central and Eastern Europe

The article argues that, of the four major potential mechanisms for integration—the state, tripartite social partnerships, employer and employee organisations and shared values—in Central and Eastern Europe only the trade unions are contributing significantly towards national employment relations convergence. Against a background of imminent European Union accession, incorporation into global production systems, economic growth and gradual improvement in real incomes, four divergent employment relations systems are thus emerging: the state budget, privatised or about to be privatised, private and multinational.     

Franchise and the transport market: a new threat from Brussels

Contrary to the general liberalisation of transport policy that has followed in the European Union for some years now, a proposal is circulating in the Council and Parliament that would reverse all the gains that have been achieved from deregulation of bus and train services. It would return effective decisions to'competent authorities'and it would drive out competent managers as they lost the freedom to manage.     

Evaluating cross‐national variations in the extent and nature of informal employment in the European Union

This article evaluates critically the contrasting explanations for the cross‐national variations in the prevalence and nature of informal employment, which variously view such work as more prevalent in poorer, under‐developed economies; driven by high taxes, corruption and state interference that lead workers to exit formal employment; or driven by inadequate state intervention leading to the exclusion of workers from formal employment and state welfare provision. By analysing cross‐national variations across the European Union in the size of informal employment using indirect measurement methods and in its varying character using evidence from a 2007 Eurobarometer survey, it was found that wealthier, less corrupt and more equal economies with higher levels of labour market intervention, social protection and redistribution via social transfers have lower levels of informal employment, much of which is conducted to exit formal employment. The paper concludes by exploring the theoretical and policy implications.     

Achieving a 10% Cut in Europe's Carbon Dioxide Emissions using Additional Excise Duties: Coordinated,Uncoordinated and Unilateral Action using the Econometric Model E3ME

Coordinated, uncoordinated and unilateral policies to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 10% in 11 member states of the European Union (EU) by 2010 are compared with unilateral policies in each member state. The paper presents the results from four projections using a large-scale, integrated, regionalized E3 model of the EU (not a general equilibrium model) estimated on time series, cross-section data for 1968—93 with international trade treated as between each member state and a European transport and distribution network. The 10% reduction is achieved by additional excise duties incremented every year from 1999 to 2010, according to the carbon contents of fuels, with special treatment of electricity (taxed on outputs not inputs) and with revenues recycled via reductions in employers' social security contributions. Multilateral coordinated policies require a common tax rate of 156 Ecus per tonne carbon (1999 prices), which rises to an average of 162 Ecu/tonne, with a wide range between regions when policies are uncoordinated. All the tax shift projections show double dividends of emission reduction and employment gain for all member states. Unilateral policies do not show much carbon leakage and they show smaller gains for output and employment. The results are compared with those from a general equilibrium model (GEM-E3), tackling the same topic.     

Structural change and female participation in recent economic growth: a multisectoral analysis for the Spanish economy

ABSTRACT

Economic growth has different impacts on gender gaps. In recent decades the growing participation of women in the labour market has reduced the gender employment gap, however a notable gender pay gap still persists standing at around 15% on average in the European Union. In this context, this paper evaluates the impact of economic growth patterns on the evolution of gender employment and pay gaps. First, sectorial feminization, direct discrimination, and structural change factors are identified and evaluated as ways to explain changes observed in the gender pay gap. Second, we explore the influence of demand, technology, and intensity factors on the evolution of employment combining gender, skill, sectorial, and temporal perspectives. As a case study, we examine Spanish economic growth from 1980 to 2007 and the influences on the size, composition (by skill), and distribution (by sector) of female and male employment, as well as the consequences for gender gaps. Our results show that structural change contributed to reduce the gender employment gap in Spain; while the evolution of the gender pay gap is less conclusive, following a sort of inverted U-shape. This paper shows the suitability and potential of the multisectorial input–output framework to analyse structural and technological changes and their impacts on the gender employment and pay gaps.     

The UK and EMU: Lessons from Europe

Her Majesty's Treasury is due to report in June 2003 on the economic case for the UK adopting the Euro. One criterion concerns the extent of economic convergence between the UK and the European Union countries. Differences in financial, credit and housing institutions between countries present one important subset of constraints to sustained convergence (Maclennan et al, 1998) - largely neglected in the economic literature on common currency areas. These types of differences create tension within the Eurozone. Empirical evidence supporting these concerns has emerged in signs of overheating in the Netherlands, UK and some of the fringe economies, and in the relative stagnation of Germany and Italy. The UK's buoyancy, however, is accompanied by serious economic imbalances, with consequent risks of instability. These would be exacerbated should the UK be prematurely locked into an exchange rate and interest rate regime unresponsive to domestic conditions. There is much to learn from European experience: from Germany and Italy, on the consequences of illiberal economic structures; from The Netherlands, on some of the risks of liberal credit markets; and from Denmark, with a liberal credit market but rational property taxation. In this paper, John Muellbauer argues that convergence does not have to be fully achieved, if there is a counterbalancing policy instrument to mitigate some of the effects of these slow-to-dissipate differences. Specifically in the UK, a reformed system of property taxation would contribute greatly to long-term stability and the preservation of economic balance.     

Work models in the Central Eastern European car industry: towards the high road?

The integration of the Central Eastern European (CEE) countries into the European Union (EU) has provoked debates about the danger of a ‘race to the bottom’ in Europe caused by the low wages and weak labour regulation and labour standards in CEE. This article examines the evolution of work models in the CEE automotive industry. It argues that the work models in CEE did not take the low‐road trajectory. Rather, a limited high‐road model emerged in the 1990s, which combined skilled labour and secure employment for the core workforce with a broad margin of precarious employment, low wages and limited employee voice. In the context of labour shortages after the accession to the EU of the CEEs, companies faced recruitment problems and labour conflicts, which threatened to destabilise this model. The first reactions of firms pointed towards the strengthening of the high‐road orientation, but the development remains unstable, not least of all because of the economic crisis beginning in 2009.     

欧盟为什么推迟认可IFRS9?

深入阐释了欧盟推迟认可IFRS9的原因,即公允价值应用扩大、分阶段评估困难和欧盟委员会换届。展望了欧盟对IFRS9的后续策略,对欧盟2015年开始执行IFRS9持乐观态度。了解欧盟对IFRS的认可机制和处理会计标准国际协作问题的做法对我国会计准则国际趋同及与欧盟进行会计准则等效谈判有借鉴意义。     

Gender mainstreaming in the enlarged European Union: recent developments in the European employment strategy and Social Inclusion Process

The European Union (EU) has an explicit commitment to raise the employment rate for women and to advance gender mainstreaming (GM) and gender equality in both employment and social inclusion policies. In this article we assess developments in the latest round of National Action Plans (NAPs), with particular attention to the situations in the 10 new member states. GM continues to be patchy and inadequate, with a similarly narrow focus in both ‘old’ and ‘new’ member states. After enlargement, the greater diversity of national situations in conjunction with ongoing reforms to EU policy frameworks create new challenges for GM.