bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Ansett Airlines Employees: A Preliminary Survey of Post-Retrenchment Outcomes
Authors: Weller Sally , Webber Michael
Published: March 2013

The events following the collapse of Ansett Airlines in September 2001 provide an opportunity to explore the impact of internal labour markets on post-retrenchment labour market outcomes. This paper traces the labour market experiences of a sample of 649 former Ansett Airlines employees in the first eleven months after the airline’s initial closure. It reveals that many workers spent long periods in an employment limbo — officially ‘stood down’ but not retrenched — while waiting for their Ansett jobs to be resurrected under new ownership. During that time, many accepted fragmented, short-term placements in ‘bad’ jobs. After this initial period of uncertainty, however, many former Ansett employees found their way back to ‘good’ jobs — either in the aviation sector or in firms offering secure primary segment employment conditions. The uneven outcomes experienced by different groups of workers reflect the interconnections between workers’ perceptions of their options, their attachments to Ansett, their age and household circumstances in the context of weak demand for their skills. The paper illuminates the ways in which the personal loyalties, social networks and work expectations developed within Ansett’s rigid internal labour market shaped retrenched workers’ job search, recruitment and re-employment outcomes.
The Temporary Agency Work Sector in Australia and Ireland: Modest, Growing and Under-Recorded
Authors: Burgess John , Connell Julia , Green Roy
Published: March 2013

Over the past two decades temporary agency work has increased in relation to most sectors and countries. This growth reflects the internationalisation of the agency business which, arguably, has come about due to demands for an ‘on-call just-in-time’ workforce. While temporary agency work possesses several conceptual and empirical challenges for researchers, it also poses challenges for regulators. This paper considers some of those challenges concerning various definitions, classifications and measurement of temporary work while comparing the Australian and Irish experience. It is concluded that while agency work in Australia and Ireland is modest, it is growing, and the conceptual and empirical problems associated with its under-recording pose difficulties for the design and implementation of a regulatory code for this sector.
A Critique of the New Consensus View of Monetary Policy
Authors: Kriesler Peter , Lavoie Marc
Published: March 2013

This paper seeks to look at the underlying framework of the New Consensus models of macroeconomic policy for inflation and unemployment, providing a post-Keynesian critique. In the light of this critique, the model is reformulated, with its basic structure intact, but with alternate post-Keynesian specifications of the Phillips curve being considered. It is shown that such modifications, either allow a long run trade-off between the rate of inflation and the level of output, the rate of capacity utilisation and, therefore, unemployment, or, in our preferred specification, changes in output and capacity have no implications for inflation over a large range of capacity utilisation. In either case, macroeconomic policy is restored to its role in maintaining full employment.
Comparing Australian Macroeconomic Management: Labor versus Coalition
Authors: Junankar P.N.
Published: March 2013

This paper attempts to assess the relative performance of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the Coalition governments in their management of the Australian macroeconomy. Given the problem of defining an appropriate counter/actual, we make comparisons using a number of different methods. Firstly we compare the averages of the key macroeconomic variables for the period of each government and then compare changes over the tenure of each government. Secondly, we use the method of ‘difference in differences’; that is, we compare the performance of the Australian economy with the US economy. This allows us to control for any features of the world economy that may be driving all the economies. A crude comparison suggests that the Labor party performed better on inflation and the real rate of interest while the Coalition performed better on growth and unemployment. However, there is no clear cut answer.
Indigenous Job Search Behaviour
Authors: Gray Matthew , Hunter Boyd
Published: March 2013

There have been a number of labour market programs that have attempted to increase rates of employment of Indigenous Australians by influencing job search behaviour. This paper provides the first ever baseline of data on the job search behaviour of Indigenous job seekers and how it compares to the job search of non-Indigenous job seekers. Clear differences between the job search behaviours of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians are apparent. Indigenous Australians rely disproportionately on friends and relatives as a source of information about jobs, although their networks tend to have less employed members, and therefore are less effective than non-Indigenous networks in securing employment. Non-Indigenous job seekers are also more likely to use more proactive search methods than are Indigenous job seekers.
An Internal Labour Market Approach to Assessing the Gains from Outsourcing
Authors: Stegman Trevor
Published: March 2013

This paper considers an aspect of the assessment of net gains from outsourcing, which has received, it is argued, inadequate attention in the analytical and empirical literature: This aspect is the analysis of team productivity, the essential element for the existence of ‘the firm’ in economic theory. The simple model presented here derives from the labour market literature of internal labour markets and insider-outsider models. The net gains from outsourcing within this framework are assessed by comparing the cost saving from production synergies within the administrated internal labour market, with cost savings from exploiting relative wage differentials in the external labour market. This analysis seeks to identify the determinants of the magnitude of these cost savings and provide a framework to allow their assessment to contribute as one facet of the ‘make or buy’ decision.
How Low Can You Go? Minimum Working Conditions under Australia’s New Labour Laws
Authors: Fenwick Colin
Published: March 2013

The Work Choices package of legislative reforms has significantly altered both the institutions and the instruments of the federal regulatory architecture for setting minimum working conditions. This paper surveys the reduced role of awards and of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, before considering the function and content of the Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard and Australian Pay and Classification Scales, as well as the role of the newly created Australian Fair Pay Commission. It argues that the Work Choices reforms have shifted power over the setting of minimum working conditions to the government, which will set many conditions directly, and to employers, who will be entitled to require employees to be party to workplace agreements that displace very many of the minimum working conditions that are otherwise purportedly guaranteed. These shifts have opened up the space for significant reductions in minimum working conditions, as well as for falls in real wages for those not able to benefit from wage bargaining.
The Australian Fair Pay Commission: Rationale, Operation, Antecedents and Implications
Authors: Waring Peter , de Ruyter Alex , Burgess John
Published: March 2013

The Australian Fair Pay Commission (AFPC) is the latest institution to be created by the Federal government in the industrial relations arena and is one of the key pillars of the Workplace Relations Amendment (Work Choices) Act 2005 (Cth) No. 153. In this article we examine the rationale for the establishment of the AFPC, outline the structure and operational details associated with the AFPC and compare it with the UK Low Pay Commission. The creation of the AFPC presumes some failings of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission with respect to its safety net wage case deliberations. We attempt to identify what these failings were. Finally, we consider what the implications of the creation of the AFPC will be. On this point the establishment of the AFPC must be placed in a context of ongoing legislative change to welfare access and in the other major developments in the Work Choices legislation, especially the creation of the Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard.
Looking beyond the West? The Korea Employers' Federation and the Challenges of Membership Adhesion and Cohesion
Authors: Jun In , Sheldon Peter
Published: March 2013

The KEF developed its identity, role and activities in the face of challenges to employers quite different to those that marked the history of employer associations in western countries. Only in recent years have economic and political developments generated perceived threats from unions and pro-labour legislative proposals. Instead, the KEF had to find ways of attracting, holding and uniting members in the absence of these threats. The result was a very limited organisation operating at low levels. As those threats emerged more fully through Korea's democratisation process, the KEF responded to pressures to raise its profile, broaden its activities and sharpen its identity. In seeking to attract and retain members and to develop internal cohesion, macroeconomic and macro-political developments have been of crucial importance, as has the central role of large employers among the KEF membership.
Changes over Time in Male and Female Employment Ratios in Australia
Authors: Dixon Robert
Published: March 2013

This paper investigates changes over time in the proportion of the male and female population aged 15 and over who are employed. It is especially aimed at studying the influence of changes in the age composition of the population on this indicator. The main findings are: (a) while the underlying trends for males and females are in the opposite direction, both male and female employment ratios fall in recession and rise in recoveries; (b) changes in the age composition of the population (ageing, per se) can explain only a very small amount of the changes in the aggregate employment ratio for both males and females over the period 1978–2001; (c) the falling aggregate male employment ratio is not primarily or even largely a result of movements out of employment by older workers, indeed, over half of the reduction in the aggregate employment ratio for males is due to falling employment ratios for prime working-age males. Policy implications are discussed in the concluding section.
Varieties of Workplace Learning: An Introduction
Authors: Boughton Bob , Junor Anne , Hampson Ian
Published: March 2013

Despite twenty years of training reform’s in Australia, there are widespread concerns about a ‘skills crisis’. This raises the question: to what extent is this a training crisis, and to what extent is it a crisis in the retention of skilled workers, exacerbated by the new relationships of the workplace? In assembling two quite distinct sets of viewpoints, this symposium invites readers to adopt a broad view of worker education. It includes voices who argue that skills training is but one element of workplace learning, the other being the acquisition of contextual knowledge, formal or tacit, about the employer-employee relationship. The first perspective is a critique of a recent attempt to train managers in the efficient use of ‘relationship’ skills. From here, a longer-term perspective demonstrates how the narrow skills approach can be traced to diffusion of Taylor’s educational theory through formal and community-based vocational education systems in NSW. A new perspective is then introduced by a conversation among adult educators, who take the view that workplace learning inevitably involves learning about employer/employee relations. Contributions from South Africa, Canada and Australia consider the relationship between practical activity and the gaining of two aspects of this awareness — union activism and class consciousness. They explore approaches to union renewal and employee participation in shaping learning. Noting the decline of working class communities and of working class education movements, the symposium ends with a suggested explanation for the fluctuating class awareness of those whom the Australian labour movement is currently addressing as ‘working people’.
Management Development as Public Policy: Australia’s Frontline Management Initiative (FMI) 1995–2002
Authors: Rozario Anne , Hampson Ian
Published: March 2013

This is one of few empirical studies of the implementation of the Frontline Management Initiative. It is based on qualitative research in six Australian organizations. Arising from a 1990s policy view, represented by the Karpin Report, that Australia’s competitive weakness was partly an outcome of poor management capabilities, the FMI was introduced in order to train first-line supervisors, who were seen as key in changing work practices. The FMI, however, suffered from the weaknesses in competence-based training (CBT), exacerbated by problems in the Australian National Training Framework. Lack of uniformity in curricula and standards, coupled with a fuzziness in defining frontline management, undermined this exercise in management development as public policy. Narrowly-specified outcomes did not deliver the claimed ease of assessment but undermined content. More fundamentally, ‘unitarist’ assumptions such as those underpinning the FMI are based on an inadequate understanding of workplace learning. Even the highly structured CBT approach cannot prevent learners from exploring their own interests and affirming their own counter- identity, in ways that may run counter to enterprise productivity.
Why Don’t Working People Want to Be Working Class Any More?: Class Identity and Education in 21st Century Australia
Authors: Merlyn Teri
Published: March 2013

Contemporary Australian workers appear reluctant to identify as working class. The article argues the inadequacy of structural explanations of declining working class consciousness, such as the claimed broadening and flattening of the middle class. Instead, it explores the interacting roles of economic conditions and worker education in the decline in workers’ class identification. The educational focus is on the decline of those informal popular education institutions that in Britain and Australia until the mid-twentieth century had aided the articulation and transmission of class identity through programs of literacy and literature, autodidacticism and political activity. Recent hard times have not been sufficient in themselves to trigger a revival of class consciousness, without the help of some vehicle of working class political self-education. The popular media have thus been able to step in, co-opting the icon of the independent battler — a non-collective symbol of traditional longing to escape oppression. Recent promising efforts to build a collective identity around the term ‘working people’ fall short of fostering class identification.
Farewell to Tax Neutrality: The Implications for an Aging Population
Authors: St. John Susan
Published: March 2013

In the light of the financial consequences of longevity, the potential for widening living standards as the population ages, and the perception of an increased burden by the working age population, recent policy changes in New Zealand appear far from ideal. For nearly twenty years, the retirement system has comprised just a universal state pension, called New Zealand Superannuation, and voluntary unsubsidised private saving. The decision in the late 1980s to promote tax neutrality for saving was critical to attaining a cost-effective, adequate, equitable and sustainable retirement income for all in an uncertain future. Nevertheless, a level playing field was only partially achieved and by the early 2000s, large imbalances in the economy were apparent. Strident calls to promote saving gradually undermined the accord around tax neutrality for retirement saving leading in 2007 to the re-introduction of tax incentives for certain types of saving, and other types of state intervention in private provision. This paper examines how the twenty year experiment with tax neutrality is coming to an end and the implications this has for the support of an aging population experiencing increased longevity.
‘We’ve Got This New Legislation’: A Review Article on Australia@Work and other 2007 Reports on WorkChoices
Authors: Fieldes Diane
Published: March 2013

The WorkChoices legislation was controversial at the time of its introduction. The controversy has continued as to what its outcomes have been, and in whose interests it has operated. One outcome of the legislation has been a proliferation of extremely comprehensive analyses of its effects to date. This review article on those reports concludes that the overwhelming weight of evidence is that the legislation has benefited employers at the expense of employees. However, this article provides a materialist analysis of WorkChoices and the wider employer offensive which contrasts with the dominant interpretations amongst the critics of WorkChoices. The paper situates WorkChoices as part of a longer-term employer offensive designed to maintain profitability by increasing the rate of labour exploitation.
The Future of Industrial Relations in Australia
Authors: Hancock Keith
Published: March 2013

The institutions of industrial relations have proved to be more malleable than I expected in the mid-eighties, and the ‘system’ has, for better or for worse, been transformed.

Underlying forces conducive to change have been the economy’s exposure to external competition, related changes in the structure of industry and employment, the pervasive free market ideology and a sustained decline in union density. More fortuitous factors, such as the antipathy of an ACTU Secretary to members of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, a Prime Minister’s entrenched hostility to the ‘system’, the Coalition’s unexpected capture of a Senate majority in 2004 and the High Court’s validation of WorkChoices, have also contributed to the present state of play.
The NSW Green Paper Twenty Years On: A Reflection on the Future
Authors: Niland John
Published: March 2013

The 1989 Green Paper Transforming Industrial Relations in New South Wales, advanced 99 recommendations across a range of concerns. Some were quite prosaic, such as the scope for legal representation in tribunal proceedings and redrafting the regulations to the enabling legislation. Other measures, such as those to do with union amalgamations, OH&S in small business, and pay equity addressed problems specific to a system that was, at that time, the least reviewed in Australia. A third group of recommendations, which are more interesting in the current Australian policy climate, addressed the key design features of how an industrial relations system could be best made fit for purpose in a competitive world.

Most of the proposed changes were implemented, either through ministerial actions or through two pieces of legislation: the Industrial Arbitration (Enterprise Agreements) Act 1990 and the Industrial Relations Act 1991. By applying a green paper process, these changes followed periods of submission taking and considerable consultation, with extensive debate.
Australian Labour Law and the Rudd Vision: Some Observations
Authors: McCallum Ron
Published: March 2013

In this brief paper, I offer some observations on what I shall call the ‘Rudd Vision of Australian Labour Law’. Before doing so, however, it is appropriate to explain how the WorkChoices laws sought to extinguish the purpose and rationale of labour law.
A New Province for Women and Work
Authors: Baird Marian
Published: March 2013

The plenary papers provide rich reflections on Australian industrial relations. Drawing on a wealth of experience, Gardner, Hancock, McCallum and Niland comprehensively cover the field of traditional industrial relations by examining those aspects that have engaged considerable scholarly attention since the 1950s: labour law; Commonwealth-State jurisdictions; wage policy; the role of tribunals; unions and industrial action. In so doing, the plenary authors recognise that industrial relations regimes generally aim to balance employeremployee power, provide conditions that enable workers to support themselves and their families, and set a reasonable safety net to protect the weakest.
Collective Bargaining under Trade Practices Law
Authors: Isaac Joe
Published: March 2013

The Howard Government, supported by the Labor Opposition, legislated in 2007 to enable small businesses to engage in collective bargaining with large businesses under the Trade Practices Act. The object of the legislation is to facilitate greater equality in the bargaining power of the parties. Except where the small business sells goods/commodities rather than a service, a person who is ‘employed’ and the business that provides a ‘service’ are both effectively involved in the sale of labour or in the performance of work in the labour market. However, the legal concepts and procedures relating to collective bargaining in these two types of labour transactions are different. One, the ‘employment’ of persons, is placed in the category of workplace relations operating through labour law; the other, the ‘sale of services', is viewed as a commercial transaction, dealt with through commercial law. This paper considers the question of whether there are sufficiently significant differences between these labour/service transactions as to justify the application of two separate sets of laws to deal with them — one to cover transactions between employers and employees, and the other to cover transactions between small and large businesses. A case study will be used to illustrate the involved and unsatisfactory approach of the commercial law route in determining what is in essence a labour transaction rather than a commodity transaction.
Social Exclusion: Challenges for Research and Implications for Policy
Authors: Saunders Peter
Published: March 2013

Social exclusion is influencing how social policy issues are conceived, debated, researched and addressed, particularly in Europe. It has also been given prominence as a focus of the Rudd Government's social policy agenda. This paper reviews the debate over the definition and measurement of social exclusion, focusing on its relationship with poverty, defined in terms of low-income. The analysis is based on the premise that conceptual and measurement issues can play an important role in identifying causation, and thus point to the kinds of actions needed to address the problem. The argument is illustrated by drawing on recent Australian research that shows that exclusion takes many different but often inter-connected forms, and that there is a low degree of overlap between exclusion and poverty. The implications of the findings for research and policy are briefly discussed.
The Current Financial Crisis: Causes and Policy
Authors: Kriesler Peter
Published: March 2013

The driver of the current crisis is the collapse in domestic aggregate demand, originating from international factors. It is important, therefore, to consider potential areas where aggregate demand can be expected to increase in order to understand the possibility of recovery. The current crisis was preceded by an unprecedented increase in the level of household debt, which will hinder the recovery of consumer expenditure. Consumption is also being affected by uncertainty with respect to both income and employment. Similarly, the outlooks for investment and net exports suggest that they are unlikely to contribute to the initial phase of recovery. This leaves the important area of government expenditure. It is argued that government expenditure, particularly in infrastructure and capital, is particularly important as in the short run it contributes directly to demand, while, in the longer run it boosts growth and productivity. Finally, approaches to financing the implications of increased government expenditure are examined.
‘The Current Crisis of Capitalism’: What Sort of Crisis?
Authors: Pixley Jocelyn
Published: March 2013

Keeping an open mind on the severity of the financial crisis and its implications for capitalism, this article focuses on the role of the state and financial institutions in monetary regulation. Questioning whether orthodox economic theorists and policy-makers share the same world view as professional and central bankers, it argues that the monetary system has in the past twenty years been stabilised through trust relations, rather than by markets. Furthermore, in this process, which was not sufficiently recognised by the practitioners, such trust relations were unable to cope with the impersonality of money. The nub of the question about a ‘crisis of capitalism’ is how nation-states can possibly control money — the most anarchic and global social relation in the world today. The article questions Keynesianism and economic liberalism alike, by asking if it is possible for states to force global banks to take the risks of lending for development. It argues that the real focus of attention needs to be the practices of complex international banking networks and the way ‘banks march in step’.
Looking Back to Move Forward: The (D)evolution of Australia’s EEO Regulatory Framework
Authors: North-Samardzic Andrea
Published: March 2013

In the context of a 2009 review of Australia's legislation governing framework government equal opportunity for women in the workplace, this article traces the history of Australia's Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity regulatory frameworks, arguing that there has been a consistent devolution in accountability and responsibility over the years. Whilst there is considerable existing research on EEO outcomes drawing on publicly available reports, the weakness of the reporting mechanism means that evidence of workplace policy and practice has not only diminished but should also be questioned for its accuracy. Drawing from workplace case studies in three sectors, the article draws contrasts between espoused organisational policy and some experiences of women in these workplaces. It is suggested that this and similar evidence of limitations in our current regulatory framework need to be considered by those crafting new legislation.
The Diversity Management Approach to Equal Employment Opportunity in Australian Organisations
Authors: Burgess John , French Erica , Strachan Glenda
Published: March 2013

This article assesses the ‘Managing Diversity’ (MD) approach in Australia, examining its drivers, discussing its relationship to legislation designed to promote equity, and examining it as a set of management practices. It has been plausibly argued, on efficiency grounds, that responsibility for achieving equality objectives must be shifted to organisations as this links contextual conditions to organisational processes. However, even where there is some prescription and guidance such as that provided by Australian Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) legislation targeted specifically to women employees, both practice and outcomes are variable. This is even more the case with MD where there are no guiding principles or legislative support. The article examines the best practice EEO and MD programs of Australian organisations to demonstrate the approaches and programs that are being developed at the workplace and to highlight the limitations of the ‘business case’ approach underlying such programs.
Industrial Relations and the World Economic Crisis in the Context of Globalisation: From Europe to the World
Authors: Sapelli Giulio
Published: March 2013

It would be difficult to maintain that prevailing theories of industrial relations have been able to comprehend the tendencies that emerged in the recent world economic crisis (Sapelli 2008). State of the art discussions and scientific predictions circulating in Europe shortly before the crisis were dominated by functionalist theories. According to these approaches, the European monetary union and the liberalisation process should have brought about, through a mechanical institutional and social adjustment, a convergence in the behaviour of individual actors and especially the behaviour of the collective bodies through which interest groups are organised. These views, which failed entirely to perceive the approaching crisis, affirmed the universal validity of so-called neocorporatist concentration.
Psychologising the Subject: HRM, Commodification, and the Objectification of Labour
Authors: Shields John , Grant David
Published: March 2013

Economists have rightly observed that labour commodification is one of the defining characteristics of the market capitalist mode. In this contribution, however, we contend that while a traditional macroeconomic perspective goes some way towards explaining the nature of the employment relationship, it fails to acknowledge that commodification is a necessary but not sufficient condition for labour utilisation. Viewed through the lens of organisation theory, the main employer agenda regarding labour utilisation is that of ‘human resource’ objectification, rather than market commodification. We seek to demonstrate this by examining how, under contemporary ‘human resource management’ (HRM), labour management theory and practice have developed into a sophisticated project designed to psychologise the employee subject into a resource object. In line with objectification, it is a project through which management seek to render human capabilities, attitudes and emotions — the basis of the worker's status as a social and organisational subject — classifiable, measurable and, hence, more manipulable.
Managing Diverse Commodities? From Factory Fodder to Business Asset
Authors: Taksa Lucy , Groutsis Dimitria
Published: March 2013

From its foundation in 1919, the International Labour Organisation's (ILO) guiding principle has been that labour is not a commodity. Following an examination of the origins and impact of this principle on ILO and United Nations (UN) conventions relating to migrant workers, the paper examines how Australia has responded to such conventions. In this regard, the paper highlights the counterveiling influence of the neoclassical economic perspective on the way migrant workers in Australia have been treated and represented from the post-war period until recent times as either ‘factory fodder’ and/or ‘business assets'. Both representations, we argue, treat migrants as commodities. To challenge this approach the paper identifies how migrant workers have distinguished themselves from commodities through resistance to poor working conditions and also management strategies that treat them as if they were commodities.
Innovation and Vocational Education
Authors: Toner Phillip
Published: March 2013

This article reviews the arguments and evidence on the role and contribution of the vocationally trained workforce and vocational training system in technical innovation. The primary focus in terms of the vocational workforce is on skilled production workers and, in particular, tradespersons and technicians. These occupations and the vocational training system are found to have a unique role and make a significant contribution to innovation in both production and Research and Development (R&D). The primary role of the VET system in innovation is technology diffusion. However, there are a number of impediments to achieving this role. These are sustained budget cuts and exclusion of the VET system from national innovation policy, programmes and advisory structures. The latter is attributed largely to the failure of the innovation studies discipline, which has strongly influenced government policy in this field, to study in detail the role of VET occupations and training system in the innovation process. This conclusion is paradoxical as the discipline’s own analysis of innovation makes a compelling case that these occupations and training system should be central agents in this process.
Modern Awards and Skill Development Through Apprenticeships and Traineeships
Authors: Oliver Damian
Published: March 2013

Vocational education and training (VET) and industrial relations systems are inherently linked. The Federal Government aims to increase the number of workers with VET qualifications but it is unclear how this policy is being supported through the industrial relations framework, in particular by the new system of modern awards. Research into training outcomes has shown that job-related factors are linked to completion rates among apprentices and trainees. An analysis of a cross-section of relevant modern awards reveals that award modernisation has had a small negative impact on the wage arrangements for apprenticeships. Modern awards continue to provide no recognition for some categories of workers who have undertaken VET qualifications through traineeships.
Mainstream Macroeconomics: A ‘Keynesian’ Revival?
Authors: Hart Neil
Published: March 2013

This paper examines the nature of the ‘convergence of vision’ that is said to have existed within mainstream macroeconomics prior to the ‘global economic recession’, and which has been the subject of strong criticism in recent times from Nobel Laureates such as Krugman, Akerlof and Solow. The nature of a proposed ‘Keynesian revival’ is also examined, and it is concluded that while the required changes in theoretical content and methodological perspective are substantial, the most significant obstacle to be overcome is to be found in what Keynes had referred to as the ‘metaphysical principles’ upon which laissez faire has been founded.
Supply Chain Security: Agency Theory and Port Drayage Drivers
Authors: Belzer Michael H. , Swan Peter F.
Published: March 2013

Supply chain security presents numerous challenges to governments interested in defending against terrorist threats. While most approaches stress technological solutions, scholars and policy-makers tend to overlook economics, labour market issues, and industrial relations. Applying agency theory from behavioural economics, this article analyses threats to the US supply chain and opportunities for efficient solutions. Using data from a sophisticated web-based survey of owner-operator cost-of-operations, it shows that drayage drivers are among the lowest paid truck drivers and workers in the US. We provide evidence that low pay is associated with both safety and security risk. Low-wage labour and subcontracting present challenges to US and foreign supply-chain security because the market attracts workers who have few other employment options. In this environment, principals and agents currently make inefficient and inequitable contracts because markets do not reflect the complete costs associated with low-probability/high-impact events like cargo theft and transport security.
Enforcing Labour Standards in Fissured Workplaces: The US Experience
Authors: Weil David
Published: March 2013

The employment relationship in a growing number of industries with large concentrations of low wage workers has become ‘fissured’, where the lead firms that collectively determine the product market conditions in which wages and conditions are set have become separated from the actual employment of the workers who provide goods or services. Instead, the direct employers of low wage workers operate in far more competitive markets that create conditions for non-compliance. We examine this evolution in employment and its implications for public policy in the US, discuss the factors driving fissured employment and sketch its main features and outcomes. We then look at the traditional methods used for labour standards enforcement in the US and discuss why they are poorly suited to address fissured workplaces. Finally, we survey how public policies might better address the realities of the modern workplace, including efforts in this regard by the Obama administration.
Is it Possible to Decouple Foreign Workers’ Wages from the Minimum Wage in Taiwan?
Authors: Hwang Jen-Te , Wang Chieh-Hsuan , Chung Chien-Ping
Published: March 2013

The impact of minimum wage legislation has been widely discussed and is a major concern among labour economists. This article investigates, from economic, legal, international political, trade, and social perspectives, the possibility of decoupling foreign workers’ wages from the minimum wage in Taiwan. The results show that foreign workers’ wages cannot possibly be decoupled from the minimum wage, and foreign workers should not be treated as a separate group of workers in Taiwan’s minimum wage policy.
Rationales for Additional Climate Policy Instruments under a Carbon Price
Authors: Twomey Paul
Published: March 2013

The plan to introduce a carbon pricing scheme in Australia has focused attention on the future relevance and necessity of using other policy instruments to reduce carbon emissions. Significant reports, including the Wilkins Review and reports by the Productivity Commission, have argued using the standard neoclassical economics framework that once a carbon price is established, it should be (almost) the only instrument needed to tackle climate change mitigation in Australia. With a small number of exceptions for complementary instruments to address some market failures, the use of other climate policy instruments, it is argued, will result only in unnecessary duplication and potential distortions. The aim of this article is to show that there are, in fact, a significant number of rationales for implementing several climate policy instruments in combination with a carbon price, and we should not be too quick to dismiss certain climate policy instrument combinations.
Valuing Pollution: Problems of Price in the Commodification of Nature
Authors: Paton Joy , Bryant Gareth
Published: March 2013

In recent years, ‘environmental economics’ has provided the dominant logic underpinning policies for ‘sustainable development’ in the form of government managed price-based and rights-based mechanisms. The advocacy of property rights in environmental management is taken further in the libertarian ‘free market’ approach and this ‘privatisation’ perspective is reflected in the growing use of property rights instruments in climate change policy. This article examines the efficacy of using economic instruments in the environmental context where ‘market ecology’ promotes the commodification of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ and their management by market forces. It argues that the pricing of ‘nature’ or its useful properties is a crude abstraction that implies ecological values can be alienated, but this is incompatible with the material and relational qualities of such values. The limits of this conceptualisation are further demonstrated through an examination of the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), a price and property rights instrument which enables private project developers in developing countries to produce carbon credits in order to offset greenhouse gas pollution in developed countries. The evident negative social and environmental effects flowing from implementation of the CDM reinforce the limitations of economic logic in the environmental context.
Organisational Support and Employee Commitment in Sri Lanka
Authors: O’Donnell Michael , Jayawardana Ananda K. L. , Jayakody J. A. S. K.
Published: March 2013

This study explores employees’ perceptions of organisational support, commitment, job satisfaction and turnover intentions in Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT). Organisational support involves the provision of valued financial benefits along with employees’ perceptions of support from supervisors and co-workers, and procedural fairness in decision-making. We found strong evidence that high levels of organisational support lead to employee reciprocity via increased affective commitment and job satisfaction and reduced turnover intentions. We also found evidence, albeit weaker, of a positive relationship between economic exchange and continuance commitment, where employees may be dissatisfied but stay because they have too much invested in firm specific knowledge and skills. The firm provided above average compensation and benefits and with limited alternative job opportunities in the formal economy in Sri Lanka the costs of leaving the organisation are likely to have outweighed the costs of staying.
Player Salaries and Revenues in the Australian Football League 2001–2009: Theory and Evidence
Authors: Booth Ross , Brooks Robert , Diamond Neil
Published: March 2013

In this article we consider the Australian Football League Players’ Association (AFLPA) initial fixed percentage of revenue pay request for the 2012–2016 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) with the Australian Football League (AFL) in the context of theoretical predictions of models of player salaries in both settings of profit-maximising and win-maximising clubs. We then explore the AFL data from 2001–2009 and show that the declining share of player salaries as a proportion of revenue is consistent with the predictions from these theoretical models. This poses the question of what the league and the clubs do with the additional revenue if they are not paying it to the players. We explore alternative talent investments (better coaching, improved facilities) as a club strategy and the changing spending on game development as a league strategy.
Uncertainty of Outcome and Attendance in College Football: Evidence from Four Conferences
Authors: Paul Rodney , Humphreys Brad R. , Weinbach Andrew
Published: March 2013

The relationship between the uncertainty of outcome hypothesis (UOH), where fans prefer games that are expected to be closely contested, and attendance is investigated in four non-AQ football conferences. The teams in these smaller conferences play games against each other and against bigger, more prominent schools in the elite AQ conferences. Using the betting market point spread as a proxy for uncertainty of outcome, two key points concerning the UOH emerge: college football fans in these conferences prefer less uncertainty of outcome both when their team is a home favorite and when their team is a home underdog.
Executive Remuneration Developments in Australia: Responses and Reactions
Authors: Kovačević Savo
Published: March 2013

Rewards for Australian executives continue to stir debate. A recent Australian government response to pay concerns was to call on the Productivity Commission (PC) to investigate the oversight, accountability and transparency of remuneration practices. At least two PC-related outcomes were controversial: the ‘two strikes’ and ‘clawback’ proposals. This article considers the reactions of two key stakeholders, namely the Australian Institute of Company Directors and the Business Council of Australia. The views of these two organisations reflect an ongoing evaluation of rules- and principles-based governance structures. Asserting the need to consider alternate analytical models when studying executive pay, the present article concludes with several questions about the intent(s) driving remuneration reforms and their possible consequences.
Double Entry Book Keeping: A Conversation
Authors: Gleeson-White Jane , Harcourt Geoff
Published: March 2013

The following is an edited version of a conversation between Jane Gleeson-White and Geoff Harcourt about Jane’s book, Double Entry. This conversation was part of UNSWriting and presented at Io Myers Studio by the Creative Practice and Research Unit in the School of the Arts and Media, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, UNSW. UNSWriting brings together writers, academics, and students of writing to facilitate the flow of ideas in and around the city, the country and internationally. The conversation was broadcast by the ABC as part of their Big Ideas program. Emeritus Geoffrey Harcourt is Visiting Professorial Fellow in the Australian School of Business, UNSW, Emeritus Reader in the History of Economic Theory, Cambridge University, Emeritus Fellow, Jesus College, Cambridge, and a leading post-Keynesian scholar.
The ‘Pre-Invention’ of Precarious Employment: The Changing World of Work in Context
Authors: Quinlan Michael
Published: March 2013

The term ‘precarious employment’ is widely used to describe irregular and insecure work arrangements that have grown substantially in both rich and poor countries since the late 1970s. Like the term ‘contingent work’, precarious employment has been adopted and increasingly used by academic researchers and later policymakers since the 1980s. However, the term has deeper historical roots and its recent use can be more accurately seen as a revival as labour markets have taken on some features characteristic of an earlier period. This article examines the use of the term ‘precarious employment’ in political and public debate in the century or more prior to the 1930s, finding that in key respects, this use mirrors contemporary debates. Recognising that precarious employment was a pervasive feature of labour markets in developed countries prior to World War Two has a number of major benefits for contemporary debates. These include a better understanding of the policies that shape the extent of precarious employment. Historical evidence also provides a guide for and reinforcement of a growing body of contemporary research, pointing to both the immediate and broader social effects of precarious employment.
Industry Policy under Economic Liberalism: Policy Development in the Prime Minister’s Manufacturing Task Force
Authors: Hampson Ian
Published: March 2013

The sudden decline in Australian manufacturing associated with the current resources boom necessitates a renewed examination of the foundations of industry policy. Since the reforms of the 1980s, industry policy has been characterised by an economic liberal approach, the purity of which has been compromised by political pragmatism — particularly evident in the continued support for the auto industry. This article examines the issues raised by industry policy, and the history of industry policy in Australia, as a context for a review of a Report recently released by the Non-Governmental Members of the Prime Minister’s Task Force on Manufacturing. This review finds useful proposals within the document, as well as a strong statement of the need for interventionist policy, albeit buried in the main text and an appendix. That this discussion is not front and centre in the Report’s presentation indicates ongoing sensitivity about the main choice in industry policy — whether the government should selectively intervene, or leave the organisation of industry to the market.
Central bank independence: A social economic and democratic critique
Authors: Pixley Jocelyn , Whimster Sam , Wilson Shaun
Published: March 2013

The advent of quantitative easing by the world’s major central banks invites renewed questions about the meaning and role of central bank independence in an age of economic crisis. This article draws together insights from economic sociology, history and democratic theory to engage in further discussion about the proper role of central banks in democratic society. We stress some related themes. Our brief history of central banks aims to show how these banks have always been embedded in economic and political coalitions and conflicts, therefore qualifying the term independence; our study also aims to show that in satisficing between conflicting tasks, central banks need to maintain a balance between cognitive competences and normative expectations. Independence is better understood as a form of dependence on the coalition of interests that supported the financial climate prevailing before the global crisis of 2008, one of low wage-price inflation, high borrowing and debt, and loss of prudential control. We argue that independence amounts to a form of re-privatisation of central banks, and that they are increasingly suborned to the pressures of financial markets. At the same time, asset price inflation has sacrificed growth and employment and therefore prolongs the crisis. The economic measures now demanded by the financial crisis prompt new doubts about the independent central bank experiment, potentially in favour of the ex ante model of governmental oversight of central banks.