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Working‐Time Reductions, Employment and Wage Costs
Author(s) -
Mangan John,
Steinke John
Publication year - 1987
Publication title -
asia pacific journal of human resources
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.825
H-Index - 33
eISSN - 1744-7941
pISSN - 1038-4111
DOI - 10.1177/103841118702500204
Subject(s) - plank , wage , work (physics) , labour economics , economics , business , demographic economics , engineering , mechanical engineering
In the mid‐1970s unions began a campaign to achieve reduced working hours. A central plank in this campaign was that it would create employment. A decade later it becomes possible to examine the economic impact of that campaign. This paper reports some of the findings of a study recently undertaken with financial support from the Reserve Bank. The results obtained suggest that no general relationship existed between working time changes and employment levels but rather varied between industries. The potentially divisive issue of the funding of work‐time changes is also examined. The results should be of interest to practitioners in the field of labour force management.