Ken Hanly asked:

>Do you have the figures? Why is this the case do u think? I guess my remark
>about the new Russian labor law is true though.

The figures are in Labour Force Update, Hours of Work, Summer 1997
(StatsCan) and Report of the Advisory Group on Working Time and the
Distribution of Work December 1994 (HRDC). See also the chapter by Lars
Osberg in the Report of the Advisory Committee on the Changing Workplace,
HRDC, 1997. The interpretation of the figures is mine although it borrows
from analysis by a lot of other people. I would attribute much of the
destandardization of working time to policy "loopholes" in the social
security and employer-paid benefit tax structures and in labour standards
legislation.

Some of the usual suspect market factors that contribute to the
destandardization of working time would include, on the labour demand side,
lean production and just-in-time workforce management. On the labour supply
side the contributing factors includes increased labour force participation
of mothers of young children and students (more part-timers), and consumer
culture and job loss fears (more overtime).

There is some debate about to what extent the changes are driven by market
supply factors, demand factors or by the policy regime. You can find most of
the arguments -- including my own -- in Working Time: International trends,
theory and policy perspectives, edited by Lonnie Golden and Deborah Figart,
Routledge, 2000. My own view is that the supply, demand and policy factors
are all mutually re-inforcing so it would be very difficult to separate them
out. That is to say, the structure of payroll taxes gives employers perverse
incentives to use the labour force in a polarized way (more part-time, more
temp, more overtime) and polarization in turn creates economic barriers to
ameliorating the perverse policy. 

The economic barriers, I should point out, are short term. A comprehensive
clean up of the toxic policy loopholes would have a salutory effect on
labour productivity in the medium and long run.
Tom Walker
Bowen Island, BC
604 947 2213

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