Perry Work Report for the week of June 13, 2013

Perry Work Report, June 13, 2013

work&labour  news&research -- follow us on the CIRHR Library Tumblr and on Twitter

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Outstanding Paper Award

Jing Wang's and Morley Gunderson's paper "Minimum wage effects on employment and wages: dif-in-dif estimates from eastern China," published in the International Journal of Manpower Vol. 33 Iss: 8, pp.860 - 876, has been chosen as an Outstanding Paper at the Literati Network Awards for Excellence 2013. Every year Emerald invites each journal's Editorial Team to nominate what they believe has been that title's Outstanding Paper. The award winning papers are chosen following consultation amongst the journal's Editorial Team, many of whom are eminent academics or practitioners. The paper has been selected as it was one of the most impressive pieces of work the team has seen throughout 2012.

Full text of the paper is currently available for downloading by clicking on the title above. Congratulations to Jing and Morley!

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Discrimination is Alive and Well in the Work Place

"[The] changing nature of racial categorization does not eliminate its real social impacts. There are a number of studies that show the impact of race and racism on the labour market experience of Canadians. Professor [Frances] Woolley points us to two studies by University of Toronto economics professor Philip Oreopoulos, who sent out thousands of identical resumes with different names. The most recent study found that employers across Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver significantly discriminate against applicants with common Indian and Chinese names relative to English names. It found that name-based discrimination remains largely unaffected by including other indicators of language or social skills, comparing occupations that require less of these skills, and by using European names, more likely second-generation applicants, than Chinese or Indian names. In our study, The Colour Coded Labour Market, using Census data, we found evidence of labour market discrimination across a wide range of labour market indicators."

The Globe and Mail, June 13, 2013: "Whatever you call it, discrimination is alive and well in the work place," by Grace-Edward Galabuzi and Sheila Block

Metropolis British Columbia, February 2012: "Why do some employers prefer to interview Matthew but not Samir? New evidence from Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver," by Diane Dechief and Philip Oreopoulos (68 pages, PDF)

Wellesley Institute & Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, March 2011: "Canada's Colour Coded Labour Market: The Gap for Racialized Workers," by Sheila Block and Grace-Edward Galabuzi (20 pages, PDF)

Metropolis British Columbia, May 2009: "Why Do Skilled Immigrants Struggle in the Labor Market? A Field Experiment with Six Thousand Résumés," by Philip Oreopoulos (47 pages, PDF)

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Without a Warrant: Crackdown on Temporary Foreign Workers

“Federal officials will have the right to walk into Canadian workplaces without a warrant as part of a tightening of the controversial foreign temporary workers program.”

“Changes to immigration and refugee protection regulations, published just days ago, give Human Resources and Skills Development Canada officials or Citizenship and Immigration Canada officers the right to walk in on businesses as part of a random audit or because they suspect fraud.”

The Globe and Mail, June 11, 2013: “Crackdown on temporary foreign workers lets officials search without warrants,” by Steven Chase

The Globe and Mail, June 11, 2013: “Warrantless workplace searches raise concerns from businesses,” by Steven Chase, Richard Blackwell, and Tavia Grant

The Globe and Mail, June 11, 2013: “A heavy-handed approach to the temporary foreign workers program”

Canada Gazette, June 8, 2013: “Regulations Amending the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations” (109 pages, PDF) Note: The Regulatory Impact Analysis Statement begins on p.1380, (PDF p.30); the actual proposed regulation amendments begin on p.1392, (PDF p.42).

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Union-Busting Legislation: First Bill C-377, Now Bill C-525

“Just as the Senate Committee on Banking, Trade and Commerce is about to wrap up its hearings this week on Bill C-377, the anti-union Private Member’s Bill from a Conservative backbench Member of Parliament (MP), another Conservative backbencher introduced more anti-union legislation.”

“Bill C-525, deceptively entitled the Employees’ Voting Rights Act, is designed to bust unions in the federal sector.”

National Union of Public and General Employees, June 7, 2013: “Conservative MP introduces union-busting legislation”

Canada Newswire, June 7, 2013: “Labour Code Changes an Affront to Democracy: Steelworkers”

National Union of Public and General Employees, June 7, 2013: “CLC says Bill C-377 is political bullying: Georgetti asks Senate to throw out the Bill”

National Union of Public and General Employees, June 3, 2013: “Legal experts say Bill C-377 is unconstitutional: Bill promoted by well-connected Conservative insiders”

House of Commons of Canada, first reading June 5, 2013: Bill C-525

House of Commons of Canada, first reading December 5, 2011: Bill C-377

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Stats Canada Releases New Numbers on Youth Unemployment, Apprenticeship

Statistics Canada has released a study on unemployment dynamics among Canada’s youth, analyzing data from 1977 to 2012.

Also, new 2011 data on apprenticeship registrations and certifications has been released.

The Daily, June 11, 2013: “Study: Unemployment dynamics among Canada’s youth, 1977 to 2012”

The Daily, June 11, 2013: “Registered apprenticeship training programs, 2011 (final)”

Economic Insights, Statistics Canada, June 2013: “Unemployment Dynamics Among Canada’s Youth,” by Andre Bernard (9 pages, PDF)

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Canada-EU Bilateral Trade Agreement?

“British Prime Minister David Cameron expressed optimism about a trade deal between Canada and the European Union, saying he believes both sides are close to an agreement.”

“‘It seems to me we’re close,’ Mr. Cameron told a group of reporters on Wednesday. ‘It would be a pity if we can’t get it over the line. It’s important for both of us frankly. Britain and Canada are both trading nations. We should be demonstrating to the rest of the world that these bilateral trade agreements can drive growth.’”

The Globe and Mail, June 12, 2013: “‘We’re close’ on Canada-EU trade deal, says British PM before meeting with Harper,” by Paul Waldie

However, other sources report with less optimism.

“Prime Minister Steven Harper... is playing down expectations that he can finalize the elusive pact with the European Union during his current visit to the continent.”

“Talks on a Canada-EU trade agreement have dragged on for four years but Harper told reporters in London that negotiators ‘have been making a lot of progress.’”

“Still, his earlier hope of signing the long-sought deal while in Europe this week now appears out of the question. ‘We are not going to set a timeline or a fixed date on which we are going to have an agreement because it is essential that we be driven by the contents of the discussions,’ he told reporters Wednesday.”

The Star, June 12, 2013: “Stephen Harper suggests Canada-EU trade deal not imminent,” by Les Whittington

Visit the Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada website for more information on the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).

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Five Little-Known Trends in Canadian Living Standards

“Canadian living standards have shifted dramatically in the past decade -- but not all trends are clear to the eye.”

“Some changes are visible -- houses have gotten pricier, more people are working in services jobs and the West still carries much of the country’s economic vigour. Others -- such as a drop in child poverty rates and still-elevated long-term unemployment -- have happened below the surface.”

“In a new presentation, Andrew Sharpe, executive director of the Centre for the Study of Living Standards, explores five little-known economic developments in the country. He made the presentation this weekend at the annual conference of the Canadian Economics Association, held in Montreal.”

The Globe and Mail, June 4, 2013: “Five little-known trends in Canadian living standards,” by Tavia Grant

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Sex Workers March Ahead of Landmark Supreme Court Hearing on Prostitution

"Six years and 25,000 pages of evidence after it began, a landmark Charter challenge to the country's prostitution laws reaches the Supreme Court of Canada Thursday. The central question the court must face is whether laws set up to regulate prostitution - a profession that is itself legal - endanger sex workers by forcing them to operate alone in the shadows."

The Globe and Mail, June 13, 2013: "Prostitution appeal finally gets its day in court," by Kirk Makin

 

“Dozens of sex workers and their supporters marched through downtown Toronto this afternoon, one of several rallies planned across Canada to call for the decriminalization of prostitution.”

“Demonstrators brandished red umbrellas and chanted ‘Sex work is real work, decriminalize now!’”

The Globe and Mail, June 8, 2013: “Sex workers march ahead of landmark Supreme Court hearing on prostitution.”

 

“First and foremost, sex workers need the empowerment, autonomy and agency to determine their surroundings, have recourse when things go bad, and live without fear of arrest and harassment. And regardless of whether they want to leave sex work, or practice it in relative safety, they should be able to do so without the legal and social structures being an impediment.”

Rabble.ca, June 9, 2013: “Criminalization by any other name... ” by Mercedes Allen

 

“In Ottawa, the union POWER (Prostitutes of Ottawa-Gatineau work, educate, resist) has created some guides to help other sex workers activists. Their toolkit includes information for allies about common challenged faced by sex workers. It dispels myths and looks at the legal rights sex workers have.”

“Their report Taking Action is a strategy guide. It covers various campaigns used historically to fight for the rights of sex workers and safer workplaces. It also has a comprehensive list of services available in Canada.”

Rabble.ca, 2013: Organizing for Sex Workers Toolkit

 

“Under the current laws, sex workers are subject to severe forms of violence and discrimination. Pivot’s commitment to the decriminalization of adult sex work is informed by more than a decade of work with sex workers from the Downtown Eastside, across Canada and around the world. Decriminalization is a necessary step to protecting the safety and rights of sex workers by ensuring that they have full access to legal protections and control over the conditions of their work.”

PIVOT: Equality Lifts Everyone: Sex workers rights website (Canada)

 

“NSWP collects documents and other materials about sex work and makes them publicly available on our website. The resources go back to 1992 and contain documents and photographs about the development of the sex worker rights movement, policy position papers from sex worker organisations around the world, academic papers about health, labour, legal frameworks, and migration, and NSWP briefing papers and publications, including Making Sex Work Safe and the NSWP peer-reviewed journal Research for Sex Work.”

NSWP: Global Network of Sex Work Projects: Promoting Health and Human Rights website

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Women in Manufacturing

“In 2012, Deloitte and the Manufacturing Institute set out to understand why manufacturing isn’t attracting, retaining, and advancing its fair share of talented women. [They] surveyed more than 600 women in manufacturing, across functional roles and levels, to gain their perspectives on how effectively their companies recruit, retain, and advance women. [They also] conducted one-on-one interviews with more than a dozen women in [a] range of roles from senior leadership to individual contributors to gain their insights on human capital and talent development in the manufacturing industry. This article represents the collective voice of women in manufacturing and is intended to inform the strategies that manufacturing leaders are using to increase the number of women among their ranks.”

Deloitte & The Manufacturing Institute, 2013: “Untapped resource: How manufacturers can attract, retain, and advance talented women,” by Craig A. Giff and Jennifer McNelly (16 pages, PDF)

Women in Manufacturing [website]

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The Script for Women Behind the Camera is not a Comedy

“Focus On Women 2013, the most comprehensive national report to date on gender equality in unionized positions in the Canadian independent screen-based production industry, paints a picture of a “heavily gendered” industry, where females are ghettoized in areas considered “women’s work” -- hair, makeup, costume, and production and office staff. Released this week by Canadian Unions for Equality on Screen (CUES), the report shows gender balance in entry-level positions, but that men progress to decision-making levels (and higher-income brackets) in roles such as director at much higher rates than women, who encounter “systemic barriers” to advancement. Onscreen, meanwhile, ACTRA figures show men make more money than women, as they age past 30.”

The Globe and Mail, June 8, 2013: “The script for women behind the camera is not a comedy, new studies show,” by Marsha Lederman

“Focus on Women 2013 is the first report of Canadian Unions for Equality on Screen (CUES). The report examines gender (in)equality in the Canadian independent screen-based production industry."

Canadian Unions for Equality on Screen (CUES), June 4, 2013: Focus on Women 2013 (14 pages, PDF)

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Talking Management: The Two Most Underrated Leadership Skills

Deborah Ancona, a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, reports that: “Interestingly enough, the two biggest predictors in our latest data set and analysis of leadership effectiveness, are sense-making and inventing.”

Watch the video or read the transcript of Karl Moore’s interview with Deborah Ancona to learn more.

The Globe and Mail, June 4, 2013: “The two most underrated leadership skills,” by Karl Moore [video]

The Globe and Mail, June 4, 2013: “Transcript: The two most underrated leadership skills,” by Karl Moore

MIT Leadership Center, 2005: Research Brief: “Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty,” by Deborah Ancona (4 pages, PDF)

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This Is the Way Blue-Collar America Ends

“Today, fewer than 40 percent of U.S. manufacturing employees actually work in factories. A reporter from The Atlantic travels to Milwaukee to see what that means for one company and its city.”

“Sailors on Lake Michigan know they’re approaching the south side of Milwaukee when they spot the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower. But the building beneath the tower acts as a marker of another sort: the structure originally built to be a manufacturing plant is now filled with white-collar professionals. As the global headquarters of Rockwell Automation, the Allen-Bradley building provides office space for 3,100 employees who range from product development engineers to sales and marketing teams and corporate executives. They’re in the manufacturing business, but it’s not quite the same business that once made Milwaukee prosperous...”

The Atlantic, June 5, 2013: “This Is the Way Blue-Collar America Ends,” by Sophie Quinton

Read more stories like this from The Next Economy, a joint project of The Atlantic and National Journal.

“The Great Recession upended expectations about economic security in the United States, and it changed the way we work and live. The Next Economy project asks: How are Americans adapting to the new economy? This joint initiative from Tthe Atlantic and National Journal will use polls, an annual special issue, national and local events with thought leaders and this site to answer that question.”

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World Bank Sees End of Poverty in 2030

“Before saying a word at a press conference in Washington this year, World Bank president Jim Yong Kim held up a piece of paper on which he had scrawled a number: 2030.”

“The finance ministers and central bankers who set the World Bank’s agenda had just signed off on his request to set a deadline -- 17 years from now, in 2030 -- for the elimination of extreme poverty, defined loosely as subsistence on less than $1.25 (U.S.) a day.”

The Globe and Mail, June 10, 2013: “World Bank sees end of poverty in 2030,” by Kevin Carmichael

The Economist, June 5, 2013: “Towards the end of poverty”

The Globe and Mail, November 13, 2012: “Middle class now rivals poor in Latin America,” by Anna Yukhananov

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Forum: Can Global Brands Create Just Supply Chains?

The Boston Review hosted a forum on corporate responsibility for factory workers, asking: “Can global brands create just supply chains?” Richard Locke opened the debate. Replies came from Tim Bartley, Gary Gereffi, Pamela Passman, Aseem Prakash, Isaac Shapiro, Jodi L. Short, Michael W. Toffel, Hannah Jones, Drusilla Brown, and Layna Mosley.

Boston Review, May 21, 2013: Forum: “Can Global Brands Create Just Supply Chains?”

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Book of the Week

 

New forms and expressions of conflict at work / edited by Gregor Gall. 
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire : Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. xiv, 254 p. : ill. ; 23 cm. 
http://go.utlib.ca/cat/8758107  

A survey and analysis of the new forms and expressions of conflict at work under capitalism. This collection uses theoretical and empirical approaches to demonstrate that there is an underlying historical continuity to current and new forms and expressions of conflict at work and that there is also a path dependency by country and culture. Although the strike is in decline in many countries, it is not so in all and different means of expressing and resolving collective grievances are used but not always as substitutes to the weapon of strike.

About the Authors:

GREGOR GALL is Research Professor of Industrial Relations and Director of the Work and Employment Research Unit at the University of Hertfordshire, UK. His latest books are Tommy Sheridan – from hero to zero? A political biography and An Agency of their Own: sex worker union organising.

ROBERT HEBDON and Sung Chul Noh.2013. “A Theory of Workplace Conflict Development: From Grievances to Strikes, chapter 3 in New Forms and Expressions of Conflict at Work, edited by Gregor Gall, London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Related Links book link

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Designer: Nick Strupat

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