Category Archives: Labour Studies

Does Professionalism Matter? in Health and Education It Still May

This entry was posted in Education, Governance, Health, Labour Studies on 20th April 2002 by Brian Easton.

Listener April 20, 2002.

Keywords Education; Governance; Health; Labour Studies

In Graham Scott’s Business Roundtable published Public Sector Management in New Zealand”, the ex-Secretary of the Treasury provides an account of the late 1980s public management reforms with which he was closely involved. The book includes a few pages on critics of the reforms, including a half-hearted account of my views in The Whimpering of the State (and these columns). Scott writes, ‘Easton makes the extraordinary claim that reformers ignored, or sought to undermine, the personal responsibility and professionalism of the core public sector.’ I am not sure I went that far, but I did report American expert Alan Schick’s concern that there appeared to be an unaddressed tension between the reform’s managerialism with its emphasis on accountability, and professionalism which emphasises responsibility. Curiously (I will not write ‘extraordinarily’), Scott’s book does not provide much evidence that professionalism is a central concern, for its few mentions are desultory. There is more concern about ‘professional capture’, the danger that professionals will administer the system in their interests rather than the wider public good. (The issue echoes the corporate management/shareholder tension I wrote about in my last column Guard Dogs That Fail to Bark.)

Reviews Of Two Books on Labour Skills and Social Progress

This entry was posted in Education, Labour Studies on 1st April 2002 by Brian Easton.

High Skills: Globalisation, Competitiveness, and Skill Formation by Phillip Brown, Andy Green & Hugh Lauder (Oxford University Press, 2001).
Capitalism and Social Progress: The Future of Society in the Global Economy by Phillip Brown & Hugh Lauder (Palgrave/Macmillan, 2001)
NZ Journal of Adult Education April 2002.

Keywords Education; Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies

‘Knowledge-driven economies are associated with polarization and inequality rather than convergence and equality’ is the sort of challenge that our ‘Knowledge Wave’ adherents, wrapped up in rhetoric rather than analysis, would want to ignore. High Skills goes on ‘How societies tackle the problem of social exclusion and positional competition fro education, training and jobs is therefore an important pressure point for all countries’. So the writers are not rejecting the potentiality of the knowledge based economy, and its benefits – higher living standards of more and new products and better quality jobs. Rather, both books consider how we need to organise society given the knowledge-driven economy which is a response to globalisation.

Mind Your I’s and Q’s

This entry was posted in Labour Studies, Political Economy & History on 16th February 2002 by Brian Easton.

Book Review of Capitalism and Social Progress: the Future of Society in A Global Economy, by Phillip Brown & Hugh Lauder (Palgrave, $67.95)
Listener 16 February, 2002.

Keywords Political Economy & History; Labour Studies

The book recalls ‘in the aftermath of the Second World War the state emerged with a new mandate to create greater economic security and opportunity, where all would see their slice of the cake increase even if some were getting more than others.’ It was a ‘“Golden era” of western capitalism … built on “walled” economies of massed-produced goods and services which offered a decent family wage to low-skilled workers. … Much of the prosperity in this period depended on a political settlement between the state, employers and workers.’

Nationbuilding and the Textured Society

This entry was posted in History of Ideas, Methodology, Philosophy, Labour Studies, Political Economy & History on 23rd November 2001 by Brian Easton.

The Bruce Jesson Memorial Lecture 2001.

This is a revised version of the paper presented on Tuesday 23 October.

Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Labour Studies; Political Economy & History

I did not know Bruce Jesson as well as many of you in the audience, although I may have known him longer, for we went to the same high school. Bruce was in my younger brother’s class, so I only just knew him then. While I have a memory of him gawky in the dreary school gray, it may be this is re-created because we all looked awkward in the uniform, so it is easy to imagine with hindsight. We did not overlap at university, but I recall being stunned by the occasion in 1966 when Bruce and some friends burnt a Union Jack in front of the governor-general, asking why we were upset about damaging a foreign flag, We were already refusing to stand up in the cinema for ‘God Save the Queen’, but that protest lifted the level of analysis, challenging us to think more deeply about what being a New Zealander really meant. However, it was not really until the 1970s I began to link with Bruce, first by reading his wonderful journal, The Republican , and later visiting him in Auckland.

Sonja Davies: 1923–2005

This entry was posted in Labour Studies, Political Economy & History on 16th June 2000 by Brian Easton.

Chapter 12, The Nationbuilders. (This was published in 2000, and does not record that Sonja died in June 2005.)

Keywords: Labour Studies; Political Economy & History;

The choice of people to be included in this book is based on a list of over forty names. For reasons similar to those of The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, only dead nationbuilders were considered. There were a number of women in the list, but despite my trying – with a grim political correctness – none fitted into the story the book was telling. (For instance, Te Puea was building the Tainui nation.) It is, after all, but one story from all of those of the New Zealand nation. Those who saw early drafts often drew attention to the omission, but could not suggest a suitable candidate.

Some Macroeconomics Of the Employment Contracts Act

This entry was posted in Growth & Innovation, Labour Studies on 28th November 1998 by Brian Easton.

Paper to the Labour, Employment, and Work Conference 7, at Victoria University of Wellington, November 28-29 1996, published in Labour, Employment and Work in New Zealand 1996, pp.148-156.

Keywords: Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies;

Abstract

Earlier this year Wolfgang Kasper produced a book “Free to Work: The Liberalisation of New Zealand’s Labour Markets” (Centre for Independent Studies). By reviewing this book, this paper is able to shed some understanding of the effectiveness or otherwise of the Employment Contracts Act. On the basis of the emperical evidence it is very difficult to reach, in a systematic way, Kasper’s conclusions about the beneficial effects of the ECA. In particular, the poor productivity growth rules out the likelihood that the ECA was a major contributor to the macroeconomic expansion of the mid 1990s. The Act would, however, seem to have contributed to the poor real wage growth, and the failure of many workers to obrtain a share in the increase in propserity of the 1990s.

The Deindustrialization Of New Zealand

This entry was posted in Growth & Innovation, Labour Studies on 26th November 1998 by Brian Easton.

Labour Employment and Work in New Zealand: 1998 Proceedings of a conference, 26-27 November, 1998, pp.38-46.

Keywords: Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies;

Abstract

Deindustrialisation is the phenomenon of the secondary sector growing more slowly than the rest of the economy, whether measured by share of GDP or of employment. Almost all rich OECD countries have been expereincing it. However New Zealand has been deindustrialising faster than the OECD average (even if the energy based industrie developed in the 1980s are included). The paper describes rthe phenomenon and discusses why it happened.¹

Productivity Puzzles

This entry was posted in Growth & Innovation, Labour Studies on 12th September 1998 by Brian Easton.

Why is Output Per Worker Growing So Slowly?

Listener:12 September, 1998.

Keywords: Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies;

A scientist puzzles most when a prediction fails. The generally poor performance of the New Zealand economy since 1985 (inflation excepted), was expected given the overvalued exchange rate as a part of the disinflation strategy. However the poor productivity performance was a surprise. By a careful selection of period or industry, or relying on anecdotes, it is possible to claim the growth of output per worker has been high. But a comprehensive review shows that productivity growth appears to have slowed down since the reforms, despite the pro-reformers promises that it would accelerate. Even those who might have expected the reforms to fail must be perplexed.

The Impact Cost Of Increasing Statutory Holiday Entitlements

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 1st August 1998 by Brian Easton.

Report for the New Zealand Engineering Union, August 1998

Productivity and Employment contains an estimate of average annual hours worked by OECD economies.

Keywords:

There is a proposal to introduce four week’s statutory leave. The current situation is that the Holidays Act makes provision for an annual leave entitlement of three weeks (15 days) paid leave per annum. In addition there is also statutory provision for 11 days, although because Anzac and Waitangi days do not “mondayize” the number of such days are 10.4 in an average year. This paper estimates the impact cost of increasing the statutory minimum to four weeks a year.

Chapter 18: Defining Meaningful Employment

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 11th December 1997 by Brian Easton.

This might be thought of as the introductory part of a very early draft of a chapter for Globalisation and Welfare State. It was written (about the same time as the book) for another purpose, and repeats some of the material in earlier chapters.

Keywords: Labour Studies;

Unemployment as a Human Problem

It is very easy to focus on unemployment as a statistic, of say 6 percent of the labour force being unemployed, and ignore that for the unemployed the relevant statistic is that each is 100 percent unemployed. The statistics enables us to distance ourselves form the human condition. Saying that full employment is should be X percent, irrespective of what that rate is, ignores the human problem for those who are unemployed.

Chapter 8: Labour Market Segmentation

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 10th December 1997 by Brian Easton.

A chapter of Globalisation and Welfare State

Keywords: Labour Studies;

While it is easy to think of the workers in a labour market as largely homogeneous, in practice they are not. Rather than treat them as all totally different they can be usefully collected into common groups, in a theory of segmented labour markets.(1) Here we use the theory in its simplest form of segmentation – the dual labour market.

Chapter 4: The Social Significance Of Unemployment

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 10th December 1997 by Brian Easton.

A chapter of Globalisation and Welfare State

Keywords: Labour Studies;

Dr Richard Smith, deputy editor of the British Medical Journal, described unemployment as a `medical problem’. (1) While unemployment has been treated as an economic problem with political overtones, Smith’s description reflects a growing recognition of unemployment’s impact on the health and welfare of individuals and their social groups.

Chapter 1: the Economic Miracle: 1946-1966

This entry was posted in Growth & Innovation, Labour Studies on 9th December 1997 by Brian Easton.

A chapter of Globalisation and Welfare State

Keywords: Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies;

For the first two decades after the Second World War the performance of the New Zealand economy seemed miraculous. Growth of real GDP exceeded 4 percent a year, consumer inflation was less that the average for other rich countries, there were strains in the balance of payments but no major crisis, (1) and unemployment was hardly reported at all (2)

The Economic Impact Of the Employment Contracts Act

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 21st October 1997 by Brian Easton.

Symposium on New Zealand’s Employment Contracts Act 1991, Californian Western International Journal Volume 28, No 1, Fall 1997, p.209-220.

Keywords: Labour Studies;

Introduction

There have been various claims about the economic impact of the New Zealand Employment Contracts Act, 1991 (ECA). For instance in Free to Work: The Liberalisation of New Zealand’s Labour Market, Australian economist Wolfgang Kasper claims that the resulting industrial relations had economic benefits. He concludes “the Employment Contracts Act has substantially enhanced the productivity of labour and capital, output, and employment growth because it has been an essential ingredient in the transformation of New Zealand’s institutional order to greater flexibility and competitiveness”.¹

The Growing Up Of the Unions

This entry was posted in Labour Studies on 1st July 1997 by Brian Easton.

Appendix to Chapter 7 of The Commercialisation of New Zealand

Keywords: Labour Studies;

The union movement will think of itself as largely marginalized by and marginally involved in the commercialization shift. This appendix explores another story: one which advocates of the reforms should be keen to point out. All institutions find it very difficult to reform themselves. Genuine institutional reform involves some external pressure. This is the case study of the union experience, but there are numerous others including the corporatization of state owned enterprises (Chapter 1).

Productivity Puzzle

This entry was posted in Growth & Innovation, Labour Studies, Listener on 27th July 1996 by Brian Easton.

Everyone Assumed That Productivity Growth Would Increase with the Employments Contracts Act. But Check the Data: No Significant Change.

Listener: 27 July, 1996.

Keywords: Growth & Innovation; Labour Studies;

The non-ideological economist would have made three confident predictions about the effects of the Employment Contracts Act (ECA) introduced in May 1991. First, it would weaken the unions. True. Second, it would depress wages of low pay workers (because of the mass of unemployed with similar skills). True. Third, it would generate productivity increases (at least in the short term). False.

Minimum Wages and Market Forces

This entry was posted in Labour Studies, Listener on 27th May 1995 by Brian Easton.

Can Market Forces Principles Be Applied to the Labour Markets?

Listener: 27 May, 1995

Keywords: Labour Studies;