Search results for " labour"

2014

Division of labor is a defining characteristic of social insects and fundamental to their ecological success. Many of the numerous tasks essential for the survival of the colony must be performed at a specific location. Consequently, spatial organization is an integral aspect of division of labor. The mechanisms organizing the spatial distribution of workers, separating inside and outside workers without central control, is an essential, but so far neglected aspect of division of labor. In this study, we investigate the behavioral mechanisms governing the spatial distribution of individual workers and its physiological underpinning in the ant Myrmica rubra. By investigating worker personali…

Productivity increases with variation in aggression among group members in Temnothorax ants

2011

Social insect societies are characterized not only by a reproductive division of labor between the queen and workers but also by a specialization of workers on different tasks. However, how this variation in behavior or morphology among workers influences colony fitness is largely unknown. We investigated in the ant Temnothorax longispinosus whether aggressive and exploratory behavior and/or variation among nest mates in these behavioral traits are associated with an important fitness measure, that is, per worker offspring production. In addition, we studied how body size and variation in size among workers affect this colony fitness correlate. First, we found strong differences in worker b…

Sanctions and the exit from unemployment in two different benefit schemes

2016

This paper investigates the effect of benefit sanctions on the exit rate from unemployment using a unique set of rich register data on unemployed Finnish individuals. The timing-of-events approach is applied to distinguish between the selection and causal effects of sanctioning. The results imply that the effect of sanctions differs according to the benefits received. Sanctions encourage unemployed individuals receiving flat-rate labour market support (LMS) to find jobs, whereas unemployed individuals receiving earnings-related (UI) allowances to leave the labour force. The encouraging effect of sanctions on active labour market policy programmes is relatively small and statistically signif…

How does an allowance for a non-working younger partner affect the retirement behaviour of couples?

2021

AbstractWe examine the effect of the partner allowance (PA) in the Dutch pension system on the retirement decisions of couples using administrative data. PA was paid to people who receive the public old-age pension with a partner younger than the state pension age (SPA) and with a low own income. PA worked as a financial incentive to retire earlier, especially for the younger partners. As of 1 April 2015, new old-age pensioners are no longer entitled to this allowance. We estimate the effect of this reform on the retirement behaviour of each spouse. To account for the fact that at the same time, another reform essentially put an end to generous early retirement arrangements, we compare sing…

Labour Mobility in Construction: European Implications of the Laval un Partneri Dispute with Swedish Labour

2006

The accession to the European Union of new member states from central and eastern Europe, with weak trade union movements, poorly developed social dialogue and inferior working conditions, has been viewed as a threat to regulated labour standards in the EU-15. This article examines a high-profile labour dispute arising from the conditions of Latvian construction contract labour in Sweden. The dispute exposes weaknesses in the protective floor of minimum standards offered by the posted workers Directive. It also goes to the core of the debate about the preservation of a ‘European social model’ and the proposed Services Directive.

Reflexión en torno a la orientación sociolaboral universitaria como área de intervención

2012

La labor de los orientadores socio-laborales en las universidades ha ido adquiriendo a lo largo de las últimas décadas un papel más relevante en el proceso de desarrollo y consolidación de la vida profesional y académica, perdiendo su antiguo carácter puntual y adquiriendo una visión más global e integradora, especialmente tras la implantación del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior. Con este artículo se pretende reflexionar en torno a la práctica de los orientadores socio-laborales en las universidades como una herramienta de integración para los estudiantes y futuros profesionales, tanto en el ámbito profesional como en la sociedad en general, así como analizar esta figura profesional y…

La producción de la subjetividad en los tiempos del neoliberalismo: hacia un imaginario con capacidad de transformación social

2003

La hegemonía neoliberal de las últimas décadas ha traído aparejadas inmensas transfor-maciones económicas, políticas y sociales. El relativo equilibrio que se estableció en las sociedades occidentales de posguerra en la dialéctica entre ciudadanía, subjetividad y emancipación social comenzó a transformarse drásticamente a partir de los años ochenta (Santos 2000). La reorganización del sistema capitalista que surge de este periodo se ha concretado socialmente, en el incremento de la vulnerabilidad social y en el crecimiento de las desigualdades sociales, dando lugar a la emergencia de la llamada ‘nueva cuestión social’ (Robert Castel 1977). El territorio de la globalización, nombre que toma …

Gestión de mano de obra en la empresa pública: el caso de RENFE

2008

Los cambios en las prácticas de gestión de mano de obra que se están aplicando en Renfe en las últimas décadas han conllevado una reducción drástica de la plantilla (flexibilidad en la salida), y una mayor disponibilidad laboral de los que han quedado (flexibilidad funcional). Dichos cambios guardan relación con la orientación privatizadora de la economía que impone un cuestionamiento del modelo de transporte ferroviario existente hasta fechas recientes. Asimismo, están condicionados por el hecho de ser una empresa pública (financiación presupuestaria, politización,...). El objetivo básico de las prácticas de gestión de mano de obra aplicadas en Renfe es la reducción de los costes laborales…

Joint retirement behaviour and pension reform in the Netherlands

2022

We examine the effects of a major pension reform in 2015 on the joint retirement decisions of working couples in the Netherlands. The reform abolished the partner allowance, a state pension supplement for a nonworking partner below the state pension age. At the same time, actuarially generous early retirement arrangements were made less attractive. Using rich administrative data, we estimate a multivariate mixed proportional hazards model that distinguishes between several sources of joint retirement: financial incentives, other causal mecha-nisms that make retirement of one spouse more likely when the other spouse retires (e.g., due to complemen-tarities in leisure or social norms) and cor…

Les évolutions du système d'innovation et le marché du travail des jeunes scientifiques

2004

In France, as in many other OECD countries, a sharp increase in the number of Ph.D. graduates in S&E fields from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s was followed by a decrease in the enrolments in Ph.D. studies. Important transformations in the innovation processes were also observed on the same period. Our hypothesis is that we assist to the emergence of an intermediate scientific labour market between the traditional academic sector and the private research sector. A detailed analysis of the production processes of scientists and of the scientific careers of young scientists is first carried out in the perspective of labour economics. Then, in the perspective of the economics of innovation and…