Quality of Employment from the French perspective

Quality of Employment from the French perspective Task Force on the Measurement of Quality of Employment Genève 28-29/05/2009

Introduction : aims of this presentation • Looking back on the presently retained dimensions of QE • Critical review of indicators for each (sub)dimension • Particular development on dimension 4a) “Stability and security of work”

The 14 (sub)dimensions of Quality of Employment • In reference to dimensions adopted by EC or ILO, are there in our list : - apparently missing dimensions, such as « Inclusion and access to the Labour market » or « Overall work performance »? - not very clear dimensions, such as « Social protection » or « Intrinsic nature of work »? • It is important to fix clear objectives in order to assess the relevance of indicators

For each (sub)dimension, remarks or propositions of indicators • To select relevant and easy to interpret indicators • To have regular measure for many countries • To ensure the best comparability • To have a small number of indicators (or distinguish key- and context-indicators) • To mix quantitative and qualitative indicators

Dim. 1a) Employment safety • Fatal and Non-fatal occupational injury rates are relevant • Occupational disease contraction per 100 000 employees and Share of employees working in « hazardous » conditions are also interesting, but more difficult to define and measure • Workplace expenditure on safety improvements as a share of total workplace labour costs seems too difficult to obtain • Add an indicator about workers exposed to stress?

Dim. 1b) Child labour and Forced labour • Fetch inspiration from the resolution on Child labour adopted during the 18th ICLS • Complement the Average weekly hours worked by children (by age and sex) with indicators on importance (number and rate) of Child labour • Add Children not in school by employment status (by age) • Add indicator on Forced labour?

Dim. 1c) Fear treatment in employment • Employed women as a share of total employment has to be complemented by « Gender employment rate gap » and « Gender pay gap » • These indicators must be extended to other categories (immigrants, foreigners, disabled persons…) • Occupational segregation by sex doesn’t seem operational (what’s the objective?)

Dim. 2a) Income from employment • Low pay is relevant, as well as average weekly earnings of employees (in PPA?) • Indicators related to minimum wage concern only few countries • To add: Working poors?

Dim. 2b) Benefits from employment • Share of employees entitled to paid annual leave and Average length of paid annual leave are relevant • To add: Share of employees entitled to sick leave?

Dim. 3a) Working hours • Average annual hours worked per person doesn’t say anything. What is important is to know if these hours correspond to individual choices. So, a better indicator could be the Share of employees working less (resp. more) than what they wish • Share of employed persons working > 48 hours per week is a negative indicator of QE, but in some countries it’s a good indicator of flexibility! • Share of employed persons working < 30 hours per week involuntarily could be replaced by Time-related underemployment rate

Dim. 3b) Working time arrangements • Percentage of employed people who usually work at night/evening, or on week-end or bank holiday, should also be regarded as bad indicators in terms of QE, unless it corresponds to individuals choices. • Add an indicator on voluntary (or negociated) forms of flexitime, which can be interesting for employees ?

Dim. 3c) Balancing work and non-working life • Ratio of employment rate for women with children under compulsory school age to the employment rate of women aged 20-49 is relevant but absolute difference may be a better indicator • Share of women (resp. men) receiving maternity (resp. paternity)/family leave benefits depends on demographic caracteristics in the country. It is perhaps better to know the share of women or men entitled to these benefits • Add indicators on care for dependants other than children?

Dim. 4a) Digression on QE vs Flexicurity (1) • In the Laeken framework, « flexibility and security » was one of the 10 dimensions of the QE • Flexicurity is becoming in European Strategy an omnipresent theme which now covers the fields of life-long learning, balancing work and non-working life, work and working time organisation, security at work, social protection… • Flexicurity has, in a certain way, « replaced » quality in the European strategic objectives

Dim. 4a) Digression on QE vs Flexicurity (2) • Between the 2 approaches, there are actually important differences which require to specify what we want to measure • The flexicurity has a more economic and dynamic orientation (it’s rather the « flexibility » component), the QE a more social orientation (driven by the « security » component) • The choice of indicators for the former or the latter has to reflect that opposition

Dim. 4a) Stability and security of work • Percentage of employees with non-fixed term jobs instead of « temporary jobs » • Suggestion: Distribution by job tenure instead of «Percentage of employees with job tenure of less than one year » only • Proposals: Rate of voluntary mobilities every year and Share of these mobilities among the whole mobilities, to promote «good» mobility and security of transitions

Dim. 4b) Social protection • Share of employees covered by unemployment insurance and Public social security expenditure as share of GDP are relevant • Share of economically active population contributing to a pension fund is more distant from QE

Dim. 5a) Social dialogue • Share of employees covered by collective wage bargaining could be extended to Share of employees covered by collective agreements • Average number of days not worked due to strikes and lock-outs is not so easy to interpret : a low value of the indicator may mean absence of social dialogue if many employees are not covered by strike law • Proposal: to add Trade union density or Proportion of employees with recognised worker representation

Dim. 5b) Workplace relationships • Subjective indicators like the 2 indicators suggested by the Task Force last year? • Or regroup 5a) and 5b) ?

Dim. 6) Skills development and life-long learning • Share of employed persons in high skilled occupations is relevant • Share of employees who received job training within the last 12 months is easier to measure if the inquired period is 1 month instead 12 months (like in LFS) • Share of employed who have more (or less) education than what is normally required in their occupation is very difficult to measure

Dim. 7) Intrinsic nature of work • Subjective indicators like the indicators suggested by the Task Force last year?

Conclusion Subsidiary questions • 2 questions asked by EMCO Indicators Group - Aren’t we building a supplementary conceptual framework with its own indicators, which will make things still more confusing for users? - Is it not necessary to distinguish several approaches of the QE, corresponding to different types of policy? • Other question : objective/subjective indicators (cf. discussion with CES Bureau)

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION

Quality of Employment from the French perspective