Re: [PEN-L] UNEF: "More than 1.5 Million Demonstrators: Monsieur Prime Minister, Revoke Your CPE!"

[Sandwichman]

Yoshie Furuhashi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

UNEF (National Union of Students of France), "More than 1.5 Million
Demonstrators: Monsieur Prime Minister, Revoke Your CPE!"

Could it be that the American model of labor-market flexibility that French neoliberals aspire to is a myth?

The Sandwichman

from: "Insider Efficiency and the Fallacy of Labor Market Flexibility"

by Peter B. Doeringer

http://www.kli.re.kr/iira2004/pro/papers/Doeringer_speciallecture.pdf

"Economists often think that market flexibility is more efficient than market rigidity, but are they right? We know that the standard textbook version of labor market theory equates complete wage and employment flexibility with a set of optimal labor market results for both workers and employers. In such highly flexible and unregulated 'spot' labor markets, supply and demand are in equilibrium across all markets and economic efficiency, individual welfare, and profits are maximized."

"What is striking to any student of labor markets and employment relations, however, is how little support there is for such complete wage and employment flexibility among employers, workers, and unions, and how rare are the examples of such flexibility in modem economies. In the United States, for example, flexible wages, flexible employment, and high rates of labor mobility were prevalent in only two historical periods. One was at the beginning of American industrialization in the last half of the _19th century when employers were just beginning to internalize labor market functions within the firm, and when union density was less than 5%, strikes were often illegal, and workers lacked both employment rights and social welfare protections. The other was a brief period at the beginning of the Great Depression of the 1930s. More often, we observe widespread evidence of job stability, labor mobility that is confined to a limited set of jobs and workers, and persistent wage premiums above market wage rates."

---

Enrich your life at Yahoo! Canada Finance