In recent years there has been important debate on the changing nature of the employment relationship, with some scholars claiming a significant weakening of the bond between employers and employees. An associated implication is that internal labour markets (ILMs) are becoming less prevalent in...

Using linked employee-employer data, this paper shows that, on average, male full-time public sector employees in Britain earn 8.9 per cent more than their private sector counterparts. Analysis reveals that the majority of this pay premium is associated with public sector employees having...

The efficiency wage hypothesis is a popular explanation of observed labour market realities, however empirical testing has been very inadequate. Measuring effort and calculating productivity has been almost impossible in modern team oriented production processes. Because this study obtains a...

This paper examines the relative importance of different types of labour market experience in the determination of earnings across occupations. Specifically, the paper estimates the returns to general experience, firm tenure and occupational tenure for each occupation within the Australian...

Two UK business services companies are compared both to each other and to their common state-owned industry background in order to assess the implications of trade union recognition and changes in bargaining structure. Union recognition was abandoned by one company under the agenda of...

This paper aims to compare the labour market effects of two alternative retirement income polices: the superannuation guarantee charge; and the higher income taxes that would be required to fund the greater pension expenditure that would be incurred if the superannuation guarantee charge was...

This paper illustrates the potential problems associated with the use of average occupational incomes when the unit of observation is the individual. It does this through an examination of the effects of drinking and smoking on income. The adequacy of the use of the mean income of the occupation...

This article explores the links between low pay, unemployment and labour market churning over the period 2001 to 2006. The issue of churning is explored through analysis of the HILDA calendar data, in which job starts and job terminations are modelled using multinomial logit regressions. The...

Contract cleaners are a significant group of low-paid workers in Australia. This paper examines their pay and working conditions, drawing on ABS data, documents and other secondary literature, as well as a program of interviews with cleaners and cleaning managers. We argue that low pay for this...

The extent of low paid work and the particular features of its distribution are important public policy issues, especially as the growth in low paid work in recent decades has been an important contributory factor in the increasing levels of wage inequality in Australia and other industrialised...