3 ms·

I think before we take that step we should explore an improvement in labor laws that make it less undesirable to enter into full time employment agreements.

brandon272 10y ago
Yes, but it's still a race to the bottom. To make it "less undesirable" for an employer to hire a full time employee simply means reduced compensation, benefits and protections for said employees. "We won't hire you on a full time basis because we need the flexibility to lay you off whenever we want and we want to pay you less and offer you fewer benefits." Do we really need to make employment as unpleasant and stressful as it can possibly become before we accept the fact that some kind of basic safety net is needed?
- jimmywanger 10y ago
  > Do we really need to make employment as unpleasant and stressful That's a large oversimplification. Employment is stressful because the business world is stressful. By entering into a contract with an employer, the employer is not only giving you a salary, but some sort of assurance that you'll be buffered from the market because the employer has larger cash reserves to ride out market fluctuations. Nobody can stop you from freelancing, which gives you ultimate freedom, but also doesn't insulate you from market conditions. By making it more difficult to fire you, the employer has to reduce compensation, benefits, and protections because the overall value proposition has shifted, since the employer now is far less flexible in dealing with market situations.
  - brandon272 10y ago
    > Employment is stressful because the business world is stressful. The business world has always been stressful; my point is that current and upcoming market forces (i.e. automation) are adding onto that stress more and more. Without figuring out some plan, people are in for a lot of misery as jobs are replaced with automation. It'll be a mistake to suggest we constantly reduce the requirements on employers to provide for fair compensation for work. If today we are saying labour laws should be relaxed to allow employers to employ people full time with reduced compensation and benefits (which seems to be the response to the article), what is the next axe to fall? Lowering of minimum wage?
    - jimmywanger 10y ago
      > The business world has always been stressful; my point is that current and upcoming market forces (i.e. automation) are adding onto that stress more and more. My point is that the business world is becoming more and more stressful for businesses also, something you're not taking into account. Automation and the elimination of certain markets affect businesses just as much as employees. When times become harder, the solution is not to increase worker rights, as that's what's happening in Europe. If you're in a highly uncertain business environment as a business, AND it's incredibly difficult to adapt by letting employees, you start hiring temporary employees, and full time employees become a thing of the past. And yes, lowering the minimum wage might be something you have to think about. There really isn't anything left to do when your labor is worth less than the minimum wage.
- ptaipale 10y ago
  It's not exactly that there wouldn't be some kind of safety nets in Europe. It's more that those safety nets become traps for some people. We don't need to and we should not make employment unpleasant and stressful. The point of this article was that the current system is increasingly making employment unpleasant and stressful, and this is largely due to the dichotomy of having either strongly protected, "permanent" jobs, or non-protected temp jobs. The more protected these permanent jobs become, the scarcer they get. Added regulation does not really help, it will just make even those temp jobs more scarce as companies (and even government organisations) get more and more careful about hiring because of the high stakes and big commitment you make with the hiring decision. Years ago, when I was freshly married and we had our first children, I was on a string of temp jobs - all with the same employer. The company lost significant markets, there were layoffs; the local union guy publicly said "we should throw out those temp guys to protect the permanent jobs". I did not like that, and I have somewhat distrusted the unions (including mine, of senior salaried employees) ever since (even if I'm a member). One of the things that makes life so stressful is that employment becomes a game, something where you think you should manipulate other people and some artificial criteria, and build relations and scheme, to keep your job. It would be less stressful just to have what you call "race to the bottom" and actually have a system where you try to do your job well and if there's need for that job, then do it.
  - tormeh 10y ago
    >t's not exactly that there wouldn't be some kind of safety nets in Europe. It's more that those safety nets become traps for some people. You'd be surprised. Many of the southern countries have rigid labor laws and strong family ties instead of government safety nets .
    - ptaipale 10y ago
      With "southern countries" you mean Italy or Greece, for instance. I know, I know - you are right and I wonder why you're downvoted because what you say is not silly nor offensive. However, there the labour laws are in fact more rigid than in the "socialist" North European welfare states which have, in many ways, more of a market economy. For instance, the policymakers in Mediterranean countries have wanted to discourage laying off employees by increasing the burden to employers about laid-off staff: you have to pay a year's salary or more to a permanent employee who is laid off. And, in the end not very surprisingly, particularly the youth unemployment is exceptionally high in Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal. What is stupid that in North Europe, the unions, such as Finland's SAK, want to have the same as in Italy. I guess there is no other plausible explanation than populism and short-term power grab by politicians who don't really care what their policies actually mean with all their side effects.
- lupin_sansei 10y ago
  The ability to lay people off whenever you want also has the benefit of employers feeling more confident in hiring people, as they can lay them off if required. It leads to more jobs and a more dynamic labour market as your job security is being able to find another job readily. By making it hard to fire Europe has also made it hard to hire.

brandon272 10y ago

Yes, but it's still a race to the bottom. To make it "less undesirable" for an employer to hire a full time employee simply means reduced compensation, benefits and protections for said employees. "We won't hire you on a full time basis because we need the flexibility to lay you off whenever we want and we want to pay you less and offer you fewer benefits." Do we really need to make employment as unpleasant and stressful as it can possibly become before we accept the fact that some kind of basic safety net is needed?

jimmywanger 10y ago
> Do we really need to make employment as unpleasant and stressful That's a large oversimplification. Employment is stressful because the business world is stressful. By entering into a contract with an employer, the employer is not only giving you a salary, but some sort of assurance that you'll be buffered from the market because the employer has larger cash reserves to ride out market fluctuations. Nobody can stop you from freelancing, which gives you ultimate freedom, but also doesn't insulate you from market conditions. By making it more difficult to fire you, the employer has to reduce compensation, benefits, and protections because the overall value proposition has shifted, since the employer now is far less flexible in dealing with market situations.
- brandon272 10y ago
  > Employment is stressful because the business world is stressful. The business world has always been stressful; my point is that current and upcoming market forces (i.e. automation) are adding onto that stress more and more. Without figuring out some plan, people are in for a lot of misery as jobs are replaced with automation. It'll be a mistake to suggest we constantly reduce the requirements on employers to provide for fair compensation for work. If today we are saying labour laws should be relaxed to allow employers to employ people full time with reduced compensation and benefits (which seems to be the response to the article), what is the next axe to fall? Lowering of minimum wage?
  - jimmywanger 10y ago
    > The business world has always been stressful; my point is that current and upcoming market forces (i.e. automation) are adding onto that stress more and more. My point is that the business world is becoming more and more stressful for businesses also, something you're not taking into account. Automation and the elimination of certain markets affect businesses just as much as employees. When times become harder, the solution is not to increase worker rights, as that's what's happening in Europe. If you're in a highly uncertain business environment as a business, AND it's incredibly difficult to adapt by letting employees, you start hiring temporary employees, and full time employees become a thing of the past. And yes, lowering the minimum wage might be something you have to think about. There really isn't anything left to do when your labor is worth less than the minimum wage.
ptaipale 10y ago
It's not exactly that there wouldn't be some kind of safety nets in Europe. It's more that those safety nets become traps for some people. We don't need to and we should not make employment unpleasant and stressful. The point of this article was that the current system is increasingly making employment unpleasant and stressful, and this is largely due to the dichotomy of having either strongly protected, "permanent" jobs, or non-protected temp jobs. The more protected these permanent jobs become, the scarcer they get. Added regulation does not really help, it will just make even those temp jobs more scarce as companies (and even government organisations) get more and more careful about hiring because of the high stakes and big commitment you make with the hiring decision. Years ago, when I was freshly married and we had our first children, I was on a string of temp jobs - all with the same employer. The company lost significant markets, there were layoffs; the local union guy publicly said "we should throw out those temp guys to protect the permanent jobs". I did not like that, and I have somewhat distrusted the unions (including mine, of senior salaried employees) ever since (even if I'm a member). One of the things that makes life so stressful is that employment becomes a game, something where you think you should manipulate other people and some artificial criteria, and build relations and scheme, to keep your job. It would be less stressful just to have what you call "race to the bottom" and actually have a system where you try to do your job well and if there's need for that job, then do it.
- tormeh 10y ago
  >t's not exactly that there wouldn't be some kind of safety nets in Europe. It's more that those safety nets become traps for some people. You'd be surprised. Many of the southern countries have rigid labor laws and strong family ties instead of government safety nets .
  - ptaipale 10y ago
    With "southern countries" you mean Italy or Greece, for instance. I know, I know - you are right and I wonder why you're downvoted because what you say is not silly nor offensive. However, there the labour laws are in fact more rigid than in the "socialist" North European welfare states which have, in many ways, more of a market economy. For instance, the policymakers in Mediterranean countries have wanted to discourage laying off employees by increasing the burden to employers about laid-off staff: you have to pay a year's salary or more to a permanent employee who is laid off. And, in the end not very surprisingly, particularly the youth unemployment is exceptionally high in Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal. What is stupid that in North Europe, the unions, such as Finland's SAK, want to have the same as in Italy. I guess there is no other plausible explanation than populism and short-term power grab by politicians who don't really care what their policies actually mean with all their side effects.
lupin_sansei 10y ago
The ability to lay people off whenever you want also has the benefit of employers feeling more confident in hiring people, as they can lay them off if required. It leads to more jobs and a more dynamic labour market as your job security is being able to find another job readily. By making it hard to fire Europe has also made it hard to hire.