Flexibility and security (flexisecurity)
There seems to be a conflict between the protection of the employment, and the flexibility (fluidity) of the job market.
Yet, if I am not wrong, Denmark has managed to combine the two with the concept of flexisecurity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexicurity .
I believe it could be worth to incorporate this (apparent?) conflict in our debate.
A reference:
Dissatisfaction at work: Putting an end to the “French exception”
Etienne Wasmer, Institut Montaigne, April 2012
http://www.institutmontaigne.org/insatisfaction-au-travail-3609.html
Employees in France are generally more dissatisfied with their jobs than elsewhere in Europe and are also some of the most stressed employees in the world.
This observation seems all the more paradoxical since French labour law is very protective towards employees and, according to several objective indicators, they enjoy apparently favourable working conditions. Indeed, compared with other Europeans, the French work less hours in the year, are less busy at the weekend and generally have shorter working schedules.
Through international comparisons, this study shows that poor dialogue in companies, lack of mobility and some inflexible aspects of French social laws are the reasons for employee dissatisfaction. It makes a number of proposals to encourage professional mobility and improve the way the labor market functions in France.
The study report is only available in french.
Group audience:
Comments
As a dane, I am sorry to say
As a dane, I am sorry to say that we should be very carefui in overselling "flexicurity".
NO doubt that the inflexible job markets in many countries are damaging to both the economy anbd to workers.
But Danmark is not that successstory someone would like to make it appear. More than 60% of voters depend primarily on the government for their daily bread. 150.000 people would get less if they actually got a job keeping a lot of people on wellfare transfers. Denmark has reached the point where every newborn citizen will have a net negative impact on state economy over their entire life. The government sector is growing increasingly more ineffeicient relative to the private sector each year - and thereby putting an incresaingly higher burden on private sector jobs. Denmark has been plummeting in standard of living ratings the last 20 years.
It is not sustainable in its present form
Thank you Stephan for your
Thank you Stephan for your insider view about flexisecurity from Denmark. Yet, you seem to be generally overly pessimistic (or maybe I am too optimistic), and therefore I still have some difficulties to make an opinion about this. Indeed my impression is that the standard of living (or let's say how it is perceived) has been plummeting in many other countries in the last years (for instance young people have probably much more difficulty today than in the past), and it is not sure that flexisecurity is responsible for what has happened in Denmark (Denmark seems actually to be doing well when compared to some other countries). In some other countries, people have to be flexible an have no security! To conclude even if flexisecurity has defaults, may not be with some qualities.
Having said that, I try as much as I can to remain neutral, and to collect information so as to build an informed opinion on the subject, or just to get a better understanding of the subject.
This is why I like the interaction on this forum.
To finish back on this subject of flexisecurity, I do not pretend this is "the solution" (actually I do not know), but I believe that this is an original direction. I believe we will more likely converge with a "right" solution, if we compare the different approaches (even the one that we consider not the most effective), because it helps in the generation of new ideas (via combination).
Concerning the context of the digital agenda, one of the question that we have to ask is about ***the future of work*** in the knowledge society, and how it is impacted by the technology and by the new usage.
In this context, the concept of flexibility and security may even evolve, in particular in relation to the evolution of the perception that the society has on the subject (in a similar way that the concept of privacy has evolved with the priorities that have changed).
Well, I stop here, since I believe it is better not to have too long posts (readership drops), and to avoid over-analyzing things (risk to deconnect from reality), in favour of proposing new ideas and concrete suggestions.
I am not pessimistic per se -
I am not pessimistic per se - if so I would not engage as actively as I have. I am, however, very clear that we have been facing a junction where the choice of Empowerment or not have radical different outlooks.
Europe in general and Denmark also simply need to get back on track or face problems
As to the flexicurity system, I did recognice that a certain level of mobility is important. But don't underestimate an buraucratci/ideological interest in claiming a success even if causality is not what is claimed.
Just because two elememts are correlated, it doesn't mean there is a causal connection. It could very well be that something else where the reason for both and they werent connected at all.
If you look to Denmark, you will see we have been doing worst in Scandinavia and our banks are worse of. We have among the highest indebtness of homeowners in the world (and thjis paid tjhe public debt through consumption taxing debt-financed overconsumption up throhout the '00s).
Sure Denmark do less bad on a number of elements, primary due to three elements - citizens have been saving for pensions since the 1970s, we found oil in the Northsea and we have had a number of global nicheplayers with strong positions in their industry.
This has been funding a over-generous public sector that have been growing a lot faster than the economy gradually shifting emphasis in the economy from productive jobs in the private sector to transfer subsidies and public service requiring a constant rise in tax burden to the HIGHEST in the world.
Only earlier this year even government economists recognised that danish progressive taxations have become so aggressive that lowering the marginal tax rate would mean an increase in state taxation.
When it copmes to public sector ICT, dont mistake forced one-sixe-fits-all/nothing bottlenecks with success - even though against the bureaucrats are eager to claim so.
Danes have been paying for a fast-growing public sector with growing taxes and reduction in wellfare for many years now. The consequence in combination with growing global competition is serious job-export whcih have been ongoing at least since the mid-90s with lower-productive jobs in e.g. the public sector covering the trend in the short-term.
We need to re-focus on demand-pull enfocing the value chains to adabt to real needs to recover the innovation capability -both in terms of getting the rather ineffective public sector and new exports up to speed.
If not further social unrest and job export as the population resist the lowering living standards and politicians are unable to manage is unavoidable.
Flexicurity is fine in good times, but lead to rapidly worsening public budgets in downtimes.