Precarious and atypical work
Authors: Vladimir Bogoeski and Francesco Costamagna
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Date: 4 November 2022
The introductory article sets out the background and the content of the Symposium on ‘Law and the Production of Precarious Work in Europe’. The analysis builds on the premise that European (EU) law, together with international and national law, is constitutive of precarious forms of work and work relations in different national and local contexts. The Symposium takes issue with the specific legal frameworks and regimes that are related to structuring various forms of precarious and exploitable labour, by exploring how (EU) law orders the world of work through legal regimes and regulatory frameworks governing specific forms of labour mobility across borders, as well as by looking at the other components of the structures and institutional interactions underlying the broader political economy where precarious forms of work materialise.
Authors: Sophie BUCKINGHAM, VVA Camille FIADZO, VVA Virginia DALLA POZZA, VVA Laura TODARO, VVA Claire DUPONT, Milieu Kari HADJIVASSILIOU, The Tavistock Institute Publisher: Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs Directorate-General for Internal Policies Date: November 2020
This study, commissioned by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the FEMM Committee, explores the phenomenon of precarious work in the EU from a gender and intersectionality perspective. It finds that women, particularly young women, those with a migrant background and women with low levels of educational attainment, are especially vulnerable. This is a recurring trend across all of the Member States within the study’s scope.
One of the key factors behind this is the disproportionate amount of time that women spend in caregiving roles and domestic work, something that is reinforced by COVID-19.
Authors: Andrea Broughton, Martha Green, Catherine Rickard, Sam Swift, Institute for Employment Studies (IES) Werner Eichhorst, Verena Tobsch, IZA – Institute for the Study of Labor Iga Magda, Piotr Lewandowski, Roma Keister, Institute for Structural Research (IBS) Dovile Jonaviciene, Public Policy and Management Institute (PPMI) Nuria Elena Ramos Martìn, University of Amsterdam Daphné Valsamis, IDEA Consult Frank TROS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies (AIAS) Publisher: European Parliament Date: 2016
The study was prepared at request of the Employment and Social Affairs Committee examines precarious employment, its patterns, trends and policy strategies in Europe. It explores the risk of precariousness of different types of contract, using information from EU data analysis and literature review, as well as case studies. It finds that there are a range and degrees of risks of precariousness associated with all types of contract, based on key indicators of precariousness.
Copyrighted articles of doctrine
Schoukens P., Digitalisation and social security in the EU. The case of platform work: from work protection to income protection?, European Journal of Social Security, 2020, Vol. 22, 4, pp. 434–451.
Platform workers face problems in accessing effective social protection schemes. Furthermore, these workers are not always in a position to build up robust social protection rights even in case they can participate in the schemes. Compared to standard workers, they work in a precarious situation. The small tasks they perform, their geographical mobility and their low earnings are issues that create problems for social security systems’ ability to accommodate these workers. In this contribution, attention to the specific working conditions of platform workers is given; starting from the concept of standard work and a discussion of the way platform work deviates from that performed by standard workers (the original basis used to design traditional social protection schemes). In a second part of this paper, the various challenges that platform work create for social protection schemes are enunciated. In the third part of the contribution, the recent EU Recommendation on access to social protection is used as a yardstick to discuss what kind of answers should be given to accommodate platform workers in social protection schemes. In the final part, conclusions around three elements that are characteristic of platform work, yet not sufficiently addressed in national social protection schemes, nor in the EU Recommendation, are developed. These observations help to establish findings on the future outlook of social protection schemes, which should be inclusive and accommodative for all (new) types of work.
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