Abstract
Chapter 3 permitted validating the behaviour of the labour movement which sought, by way of offensive strikes during the growth phases of the Juglar cycle, to reduce working time in order to increase wages and thus make this cycle more regular. This chapter also allowed interpreting the observation made by historians that during the growth phases of this cycle, the profits of companies increased faster than wages, whereas the contrary occurred during recession phases. We showed that the origin of these facts lies in the asymmetry of power predominating in the labour market between employers and employees. In a context of technical progress, employers can influence the volume of work supplied by employees to such an extent that gains in productivity and the rise in added value generated during growth phases benefit the income gleaned from capital more than that earned from work. After several years, this growth results in a crisis of overinvestment and overproduction.
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Notes
Some economists and politicians explain unemployment by the poor (or nonexistent) qualifications of part of the population. This prevents these workers from generating productivity equal to or better than the guaranteed minimum wage rate (SMIC). To our thinking, this mistakes a consequence for a cause; a farmer, after having purchased more fertiliser than he can optimally utilise on his farm, might as well complain that the price of fertiliser is higher than the value of his marginal product! When examining the history of education (Prost, A., Histoire de l’enseignement en France, 1800–1967, Colin, 1970), it can be seen that till very recently, for the great majority of employees, professional training was done exclusively on the job. However, this has not prevented the economy from undergoing radical technological changes since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. Each time, companies and workers have known how to adapt to them. Take the qualifications of the labour force that underpinned the Post-War Boom: probably 80% of this force had not gone beyond primary school education and had strictly no initial vocational training when entering active life. (This counts few if any of the immigrant workers that spoke little or none of the language of the host country that companies recruited massively during this period.) The generations born after World War II systematically continued their education beyond primary school. And by fortuitous coincidence, around 1970, when the economy began its long crisis of slow growth, these generations, which were on average better educated than their predecessors, entered professional life. Despite all the shortcomings of and criticism levelled at the education system (none of which are new!), the level of initial education has improved constantly over a long period, esp. since the 1960s, as proved by the INSEE data drawn from population and education- employment surveys. It is also difficult to see how current technological changes could make part of the population less productive than it has been in the past. It is the relative abundance of such unused labour in relation to the needs of the economy that led companies to become much more selective regarding qualifications during recruitment in the last 25 years of the 20th century, contrary to the previous 25 years. This trend continues at the beginning of the 21st century.
Gadrey, J., Jany-Catrice, F., and Ribault, T., France-Japon-Etats-Unis: L’emploi en détail, PUF, Paris, 1999. Recall what was said previously (Ch. 1, §4.3, n. 64): in comparison to France, the full-time working week in the United States was comparable (and even lower) from 1870 to World War II, then lower until 1982 (esp. in the 1950s and 1960s) and finally higher from 1982 on. Income inequality was lower in the USA in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s and then increased (esp. since 1980), whereas in France it evolved less significantly.
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© 2014 Jean Vercherand
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Vercherand, J. (2014). The Normative Implications for Labour Policies. In: Labour. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137373618_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137373618_6
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
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