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June 14, 2012
- New Poll Says 175 Million Union Members Worldwide Are Worried and Uncertain
- Sign Up! Unions Are Good For Your Health
- American Still Value Unions
- GM Workers in Canada Facing Layoffs and Lower Wages
- Not Another Lawyer Joke - U.S. Law School Grads Struggle With Low Employment Rates
- Human Capital in Review
- Canada’s Flagging Productivity Levels
- Where the Work is Now in Canada, and Why Some Won’t Go
- The World of Work Report 2012
- The U.S. Labour Market, Post-Recession
- The Decline of the American Middle Class
- Toronto’s Top Dogs With Jobs
- Book of the Week
New Poll Says 175 Million Union Members Worldwide Are Worried and Uncertain
"The first international public opinion polling commissioned by the Brussels-based global union representing 175 million union members across the world shows deep uncertainty, fear and political disempowerment across half the G20 economies, six European countries and four emerging economies. The poll commissioned by the International Trade Union Confederation from global market research company TNS covers a total of 13 countries".
International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), June 12, 2012: “First international poll by global union reveals deep mistrust of economic decision makers”
International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), Anker Solutions, June 2012: ITUC Global Poll, 2012. Final Report, 13-Country Poll (PDF, 31 pages)
Sign Up! Unions Are Good For Your Health
“We already knew that unions increase wages, especially for less-educated workers. They also strongly increase the probability that a worker will have benefits like health care insurance, a pension, or paid sick days and family leave. It turns out that unions are also good for your health. A new study by Megan Reynolds and David Brady at Duke University finds that being a union member has a large positive effect on self-rated health status. This effect is largest for less-educated workers. Given that unions provide a much greater degree of security on the job and protection against arbitrary actions by capricious bosses, it perhaps is not surprising to see that unions are associated with better health. After all stress can be a major factor leading to bad health. Still it is nice to see that Reynolds and Brady have produced the evidence showing that this is the case”.
Center for Economic and Policy Research, June 11, 2012: “Unions are Good for Your Health”, by Dean Baker
Social Forces Advance Access, March 30, 2012: “Bringing You More Than the Weekend: Union Membership and Self-rated Health in the United States”, by Megan M. Reynolds, Duke University; David Brady, Duke University (PDF, 27 pages)
American Still Value Unions
The 2012 American Values Survey from the Pew Research Center reveal that overall, 64% of Americans “agree that labor unions are necessary to protect the working person; 33% disagree. Positive views of labor unions have stabilized, after declining by 13 points from 2003 to 2009”. Section 5, Page 61: Values about Business, Wall Street and Labor
The Pew Research Centre, June 4, 2012: 2012 American Values Survey. Includes slide show, Infographics and PDF reports for downloading.
The Pew Research Centre, June 4, 2012: Trends in American Values: 1987-2012, Partisan Polarization Surges in Bush, Obama Years. (PDF, 168 pages)
GM Workers in Canada Facing Layoffs and Lower Wages
“General Motors Co. chairman Dan Akerson has added to the pressure being heaped on the Canadian Auto Workers to cut hourly labour costs as the Detroit Three auto makers and the union skirmish ahead of a critical set of negotiations on a new contract. The drumbeat of demands that the union address hourly wage costs is reaching a crescendo three months before the scheduled September expiry of the contracts between the union and the three companies”.
The Globe and Mail, June 13, 2012: “GM chair joins chorus calling on CAW to cut wages; ‘Canada is the most expensive place to build a car in the world right now,' Akerson tells news conference”, by Greg Keenan
The Globe and Mail, June 6, 2012: “Auto makers tell union wage hikes won’t happen”, by Greg Keenan
The Globe and Mail, June 2, 2012: “GM to slash Oshawa line, move production to Tennessee; Layoffs will leave 8,000 Canadian employees, down from 40,000 in the early nineties”, by Greg Keenan and Steven Chase
The Toronto Star, June 1, 2012: “GM closure of Oshawa plant signals tough labour talks to come”, by Dana Flavelle
Not Another Lawyer Joke - U.S. Law School Grads Struggle With Low Employment Rates
"Employment rates for the law school class of 2011 are at an 18-year low, according to NALP, formerly known as the National Association for Law Placement, which reported that less than half of students have found jobs in private practice. The overall employment rate for new law graduates is 85.6%, the lowest since 1994 when it was 84.7%, and the figures for the class of 2011 show a job market with “many underlying structural weaknesses,” NALP noted. What’s more, less than 66% of recent graduates were employed in job requiring bar membership - down 9% since 2008 – leaving one third of graduates either in jobs that don’t require a law degree, back in school or unemployed".
NALP (The Association for Legal Professionals), 2012: “Class of 2011 Law School Grads Face Worst Job Market Yet— Less Than Half Find Jobs in Private Practice. The Employment Profile for the Law School Class of 2011 May Represent the “Bottom”—Class Faced Brutal Entry-Level Job Market”, Commentary and Analysis by James Leipold, Executive Director
Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2012: “With Profession Under Stress, Law Schools Cut Admissions”, by Joe Palazzolo and Chelsea Phipps
Toronto Star, June 8, 2012: “Job posting on Boston College career site offers law grads $10K a year”, by Anita Li
Wall Street Journal, June 8, 2012: “Law School Class of 2011 Jobs Data Shows 18-Year Low”, by Sam Favate
Human Capital in Review
A new Conference Board publication "discusses current implementation of SWP by companies and the latest research on using it to benefit the business. For example, in particular, companies have yet to marry their strategic workforce planning strategy with the effects of the impending retirement of the Baby Boomer generation. This edition also discusses the use of analytics in SWP efforts and what benefits they bring, including measuring the effectiveness of a companies existing talent management strategies such as diversity and inclusion and employee engagement. Organizations could benefit even further by applying analytics to the management of their contingent workforce.”
The Conference Board Human Capital in Review™: Focus on Strategic Workforce Planning (Vol. 2, No. 2, 2012): “Human Capital in Review”, by Lara Rosner, Mary B. Young
(Available to the University of Toronto community, via your Conference Board of Canada e-library account)
Canada’s Flagging Productivity Levels
Canada has weathered the global economic crisis comparatively well but will have to become more productive to sustain its high standard of living, according to OECD’s latest Economic Survey of Canada. The report “notes that a timely fiscal stimulus, low interest rates, a solid banking sector and revenues from natural resources helped Canada return to a stable growth path after the global economic crisis of 2008-09. With rising real estate prices and high household indebtedness now posing new risks, the OECD projects that Canada’s economy will grow by around 2¼ per cent in 2012, and by around 2½ per cent in 2013”. “The report identifies sluggish productivity growth as the main long-term challenge facing Canada’s economy”.
OECD, June 13, 2012: OECD Economic Surveys: Canada. Overview. (PDF, 42 pages)
OECD, June 13, 2012: “Economy: Canada needs to boost innovation and human capital to sustain living standards”
The Globe and Mail, June 13, 2012: “Canada needs to jump-start productivity: OECD”, by Barrie McKenna
The Toronto Star, June 13, 2012: “Canada’s flagging productivity”, by Madhavi Acharya-Tom Yew
Where the Work is Now in Canada, and Why Some Won’t Go
CBC News, June 8, 2012: “Where Canada's job vacancies are - and aren't: Some EI recipients face stiffer competition and longer odds to find work”. Interactive map.
The Globe and Mail, June 6, 2012: “Stuck in place: Canada’s mobility problem”, by Tavia Grant
The World of Work Report 2012
“The World of Work Report 2012 provides a comprehensive analysis of recent labour market and social trends, assesses risks of social unrest and presents employment projections for the next five years. The report emphasizes that while employment has begun to recover slowly, job quality is deteriorating and there is a growing sense of unfairness. Moreover, given the pressure on governments to rein in expenditure, policy efforts have focused on structural reforms to boost employment creation. However, if policy instruments are not carefully designed, they could exacerbate the employment situation and aggravate further equity concerns, with potentially long-lasting adverse consequences for both the economy and society”.
ILO, 2012: World of Work Report 2012: Better jobs for a better economy. (Full Report, PDF, 128 pages)
World of Work Report 2012: Key charts. Animated. Presentation from April 27, 2012
The U.S. Labour Market, Post-Recession
“Four years after the beginning of the Great Recession, the labor market remains historically weak. Many observers have concluded that "structural" impediments to recovery bear some of the blame. This paper reviews such structural explanations. I find that there is little evidence supporting these hypotheses, and that the bulk of the evidence is more consistent with the hypothesis that continued poor performance is primarily attributable to shortfalls in the aggregate demand for labor”.
University of California, Berkeley and NBER, March 2012: “The Labor Market Four Years Into the Crisis: Assessing Structural Explanations", by Jesse Rothstein. (PDF, 49 pages)
The Decline of the American Middle Class
“The recent economic crisis left the median American family in 2010 with no more wealth than in the early 1990s, erasing almost two decades of accumulated prosperity, the Federal Reserve said Monday. [...]The new data comes from the Fed’s much-anticipated release on Monday of its Survey of Consumer Finances, a report issued every three years that is one of the broadest and deepest sources of information about the financial health of American families. While the numbers are already 18 months old, the survey illuminates problems that continue to slow the pace of the economic recovery. The Fed found that middle-class families had sustained the largest percentage losses in both wealth and income during the crisis, limiting their ability and willingness to spend.”.
Federal Reserve Bulletin, June, 2012: Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2007 to 2010: Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances (PDF, 80 pages)
Special to CNN, June 13, 2012: “Why middle class has taken a big hit”, by Dean Baker, economist and director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research
The Atlantic, June 13, 2012: “How Badly Has Obama Alienated the Middle Class?”, by Michael Hirsh
CNNMoney, June 12, 2012: “Family net worth plummets nearly 40%”, by Charles Riley
Salon, June 12, 2012: “Middle-class catastrophe: The Fed releases brutal details on how the crash sucker-punched America. So why won't it do anything?”, by Andrew Leonard
The New York Times, June 11, 2012: “Family Net Worth Drops to Level of Early ’90s, Fed Says”, by Binyamin Appelbaum
University of California, Berkeley, March 2, 2012: “Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States” by Emmanuel Saez (PDF, 10 pages)
Toronto’s Top Dogs With Jobs
The GridTO, June 6, 2012: “Toronto’s top 16 under 16”, by Chris Bilton, Sarah Liss, Katie Underwood and Danielle Groen
“16 of the city’s hardest-working pups—career canines for whom being “man’s best friend” is a just a sideline. From educators to entertainers, pro athletes to detectives, we asked breeds big and small (and the owners who walk them) for their professional stories—and looking good, chowing down, and unwinding in the city”.
Book of the Week
How to find a job on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, by Brad Schepp and Debra Schepp. 2nd ed. New York, NY : McGraw-Hill, 2012. 253 p. ISBN 9780071790437
How to Find a Job on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, Second Edition, helps you take full advantage of the bounty of opportunities found on the most popular sites. Online job-search experts Brad and Debra Schepp take you step-by-step through the process of joining networks, creating effective online profiles, and leveraging the job-search features of the most popular sites, including:
LinkedIn's InMaps—Get a complete visual of your network for a faster, more efficient job search
Facebook's BranchOut—Learn more about your friends’ careers, so you can help them—and they can help you
Twitter's Lists—Build a customized list of users to discover opportunities you might otherwise miss
Google+'s Circles—Get the most relevant information about yourself into the hands of the right people
About the authors
Brad Schepp and Debra Schepp have written numerous books together. Their work has been featured in publications such as Newsweek, Chicago Tribune, Life magazine, Los Angeles Times, and CNNMoney.
Visit the Recent Books at the CIRHR Library blog.
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