Women's careers are one-third shorter than men's and four times more intensive than men's in part‑time work and flexible working time arrangements

2011 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marianne van Zwieten ◽  
Jan Fekke Ybema ◽  
Goedele Geuskens

Terms of employment and the preferred retirement age Terms of employment and the preferred retirement age The present study examines how the satisfaction with the terms of employment among older employees affects the preferred retirement age. Two waves of data collection (2008 and 2009) of the cohort-study of the Netherlands Working Conditions Survey (NWCS) were used for this study. The results of this longitudinal study showed that satisfaction with terms of employment that concern flexibility (e.g. flexible working hours and the possibilities for part-time work) contribute to a higher preferred retirement age. It also contributes to not specifying the preferred retirement age. This means that employees who are satisfied with the flexibility in their jobs more often do not know at what age they prefer to retire than employees who are not satisfied, but if they do know they report a higher preferred retirement age. By arranging flexibility in the job together with and to the satisfaction of employees, employees can be stimulated to postpone retirement.


2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (6) ◽  
pp. 888-902 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Ilsøe ◽  
Trine Pernille Larsen ◽  
Jonas Felbo-Kolding

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of part-time work on absolute wages. The empirical focus is wages and working hours in three selected sectors within private services in the Danish labour market – industrial cleaning, retail, hotels and restaurants – and their agreement-based regulation of working time and wages. Theoretically, this analysis is inspired by the concept of living hours, which addresses the interaction between working hours and living wages, but adds a new layer to the concept in that the authors also consider the importance of working time regulations for securing a living wage. Design/methodology/approach The paper builds on desk research of collective agreements and analysis of monthly administrative register data on wages and working hours of Danish employees from the period 2008-2014. Findings This analysis shows that the de facto hourly wages have increased since the global financial crisis in all three sectors. This is in accordance with increasing minimum wage levels in the sector-level agreements. The majority of workers in all three sectors work part-time. Marginal part-timers – 15 hours or less per week – make up the largest group of workers. The de facto hourly wage for part-timers, including marginal part-timers, is relatively close to the sector average. However, the yearly job-related income is much lower for part-time than for full-time workers and much lower than the poverty threshold. Whereas the collective agreement in industrial cleaning includes a minimum floor of 15 weekly working hours – this is not the case in retail, hotels and restaurants. This creates a loophole in the latter two sectors that can be exploited by employers to gain wage flexibility through part-time work. Originality/value The living wage literature usually focusses on hourly wages (including minimum wages via collective agreements or legislation). This analysis demonstrates that studies of low-wage work must include the number of working hours and working time regulations, as this aspect can have a dramatic influence on absolute wages – even in cases of hourly wages at relatively high levels. Part-time work and especially marginal part-time work can be associated with very low yearly income levels – even in cases like Denmark – if regulations do not include minimum working time floors. The authors suggest that future studies include the perspective of living hours to draw attention to the effect of low number of weekly hours on absolute income levels.


Author(s):  
Hanne Cecilie Kavli ◽  
Heidi Nicolaisen ◽  
Sissel C. Trygstad

The growth in marginalized part-time work is a phenomenon often seen as part of an ongoing dualisation process in the labour market. Involuntary part-time is closely associated with marginalization. In Norway, the policy makers have tried to combat involuntary part-time work by introducing changes in the Working Environment Act (WEA). The intention was to make it easier for involuntary part-time workers to increase their working time. In this chapter, we focus on the Norwegian health care sector, a sector characterised by both part-time work and labour shortage. Drawing on in-depth interviews with employers and workers, we study if the WEA amendments have been effective in terms of providing increased working time for involuntary part-timers. Surprisingly, we find that the changes in the law seem to have produced unintended consequences at the workplace level. Our analysis suggest that some employers interpret the labour law changes as attempts to limit the managerial prerogative and adapt strategically to avoid its implications. This adaptation reduces the chance to escape involuntary part-time for low educated workers with limited power resources, while workers with higher education and a stronger bargaining position to a larger degree can benefit from the new regulations.


1999 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 481-501 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danièle Meulders ◽  
Robert Plasman

In most of the European Union countries, decisions related to the third pillar guidelines fall to those involved in collective bargaining. This is certainly the case for everything covered under Guideline 16 and, in particular, questions related to the reduction, reorganisation or modernisation of working time, with the exception of part-time work, which is very often the subject of statutory or legislative measures. Thus, we find numerous references to part-time work in the NAPs, whether to measures intended to facilitate the use of this form of work by employers or employees, or to the need to improve the working conditions of part-timers. On the other hand, all of the NAPs - with a few exceptions - are very circumspect, or not very explicit, about aspects linked to the duration and organisation of working time. It is difficult, moreover, to judge the progress made within the Member States with respect to partnership at all levels, as encouraged in the guidelines, which is meant to be one of the essential factors contributing to a modernisation of work organisation and an improvement in firms' adaptability. Although social pacts have been concluded in certain countries (Italy, Ireland, Luxembourg, Finland), their real scope cannot be evaluated by studying the National Action Plans. Moreover, their possible effects can only be judged over time. Investment in human capital is without doubt the aspect which comes up least in the NAPs, or can in any case be described as the dimension where innovative input is most lacking. Finally, the gender dimension puts in too rare an appearance in the third pillar, even though working time, employment contracts and training are three areas where the gender dimension is essential and causes significant stratification. It emerges from a close examination of the NAPs that the third pillar is interpreted in too restrictive a manner, underestimating the modernisation of work organisation aspect, and lacking an overall vision of the true potential of a strategy to modernise the organisation of work and working time.


Author(s):  
Heejung Chung

This chapter examines part-time working women's access to flexitime, that is the worker's control over their schedules such as starting and ending times, and time off work (a couple of hours during their working day) to tend to personal issues. It further examines whether this relative access varies across countries. The analysis of data from 30 European countries show that at the European average, part-time workers are more likely to get access to flexitime - showing evidence of a complimentary effect, and are as likely to get access to time off work for personal reasons as full time workers. There was a significant cross-national variance in part-time worker's relative access to flexitime compared to that of full-time workers. Countries where part-time work is more prevalent, where strong centralised unions exist, and family policies are generous were where women generally had better access to flexitime. However, this was especially the case for full-time working women, decreasing the gap between full-time and part-time working women


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (516) ◽  
pp. 207-212
Author(s):  
S. H. Rudakova ◽  
◽  
L. V. Shchetinina ◽  
N. S. Danylevych ◽  
A. S. Kohdenko ◽  
...  

The article is aimed at valuating the experience of using mixed modes in the context of the COVID-2019 pandemic based on the results of sociological studies as well as substantiating the potential for the development of legal and regulatory provision. In the context of the pandemic, many enterprises switched to remote work and the working hours changed. For Ukraine, this is a new experience in implementing online work and a more flexible working day, so it is important to study this issue. During the COVID-2019 pandemic, enterprises faced the only legal opportunity to organize their activities through work at home. The authors carried out a sociological study on the use of mixed modes in the context of the COVID-2019 pandemic, which found out that 69.6% of respondents work remotely, 60.9% work on a flexible schedule, and 43.5% of respondents account for part-time work. 73.9% of the respondents faced mixed working modes. Regarding the preparedness of business owners to work in the new conditions, it is found out that the majority of respondents are satisfied with how their organization has switched to a remote or mixed form of work. Remote work can be combined with other modes, such as part-time or flexible working hours and full-time work. This combination can be considered as a mixed working time mode. According to the outcome of sociological researches, the use of mixed working hours is already a common reality, not an exception. Use of them has its own peculiarities in various spheres of activity, which requires further research. The survey identified the respondents both satisfied and dissatisfied with mixed working hours. It should be noted about the available potential to improve the legal and organizational-economic principles of using mixed modes of working time organization.


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