Suchergebnisse

The European Union has developed a complex strategy and policy coordination process to promote gender equality in all community policies through "gender mainstreaming". While every member country has to promote the policy objective of gender equality, the instruments implemented to that end may differ. Different institutional structures and gender roles in the society may result in different outcomes of the same policy measure. Therefore every country has to choose those instruments best fitted to achieve gender equality. This paper outlines the various positions of the individual member countries relative to gender relations, with a special emphasis on Austria. Overall, it is the state and public sector institutions which tend to take a lead in implementing affirmative action programmes, in the main positive discrimination of women (quota regulations, targets) and enforcement of antidiscrimination legislation. Affirmative action programmes in private industry are not a universal feature in all EU countries. While gender equality is pursued as a moral issue in its own right, it is also an instrument to combat the negative impact of ageing of the European populations on welfare budgets and economic growth.

The integration of migrant women and youth into the labour market depends upon institutional ramifications (in particular the immigration regime, the welfare model and the education system), on supply factors (in particular the educational attainment level and occupational skills, language competence, ethnic origin and the proximity to the ethnic cultural identity of the host country), and demand factors (in particular the composition by economic sectors, the division of work between the household, the informal and the market sector and the economic and technological development level).

Family policy is getting increasing public policy attention in the EU as a result of population ageing and the challenge of the sustainability of economic growth. It is being recognised that a sustainable rise in the fertility rate is needed in order to put a break on population ageing. Immigration can postpone but not stem the tide of ageing. In consequence, research into the reasons for the decline in the fertility rate and the role of public policy in promoting fertility gain momentum. There is growing evidence that social and economic policies do have an important role to play in raising fertility. Properly devised, they allow a better balance of market and family work and raise the propensity to invest in higher education and training, thereby furthering the sustainability of economic growth and wellbeing of the society.

The European Employment Strategy (EES) has been put in place in order to ensure the survival of the European Social Model in view of institutional change resulting from the introduction of the European Monetary System. It has become the platform of a method of open coordination of social and employment policy. It represents a new method of governance through soft law, as the traditional governance scheme of binding directives failed to find acceptance among member countries in core areas of national policy development and implementation.

The increasing employment of women in Europe is not only a result of economic restructuring, but also a consequence of changing family structures, changing expectations, changing wage determination mechanisms and increasing urbanisation. Many of the services which have been outsourced from the household sector to the market sector tend to remain almost exclusively a female employment domain. Thus, the areas of production that constitute the domain of female work in traditional societies remain the same in the developed industrial societies; only the degree of marketisation differs. The extent to which domestic work is outsourced depends upon the welfare model. Thus, it is a different set of taxes, transfer payments and public services in the various models which impacts on the relative efficiency and direct and indirect costs of goods and services which can be produced in the household or the market sector. Different institutional settings impact on the opportunity cost of domestic work and/or the shadow price of the domestic good or service, resulting in a divergence of the employment rate of women between the various models in the EU.

Der rasche technologische Wandel führt dazu, dass sich die Arbeitsanforderungen ständig ändern. Gleichzeitig steigt die Beschäftigungsfluktuation und Betriebe investieren nicht mehr ausreichend in die Weiterbildung ihrer MitarbeiterInnen. In dieser Situation führt kein Weg an der Entwicklung eines Systems der Erwachsenenbildung vorbei. Ein derartiges System basiert auf drei Stützpfeilern: einem institutionellen, einem finanziellen und einem qualifikatorischen. Der institutionelle Rahmen stellt sicher, dass die institutionellen AkteurInnen im Bereich der Aus- und Weiterbildung in die Planung und Umsetzung eines lebensbegleitenden Systems des Lernens eingebunden werden. Das kann über die Errichtung eines Erwachsenenbildungsrates oder eines Bundesamts für Weiterbildung erfolgen, das auch eine Bundesakkreditierungsagentur beherbergt. Der finanzielle Rahmen muss so ausgestaltet sein, dass sowohl individuelle Lernchancen im Lebenshorizont gewährleistet sind, als auch gesellschaftliche und wirtschaftliche bildungspolitische Ziele erfüllt werden. Zu letzteren zählt die Erhaltung der wirtschaftlichen Wettbewerbsfähigkeit der Region ebenso wie die aus demokratiepolitischer Sicht wichtige Sicherstellung eines hohen Bildungsgrads einer reifen postindustriellen Gesellschaft. Die Qualifikationsanpassung soll innerhalb eines internationalen Qualifikationsrahmens stattfinden (Europäischer Qualifikationsrahmen), in den die national anerkannten beruflichen und fachlichen Fähigkeiten und Bildungsabschlüsse eingeordnet und damit allseits transparent gemacht werden. (DIPF/Orig.)

There is no simple answer to the question of the potential impact of migration on the EU economy. EU migration policy is expected to meet the requirements of economic and social policy, in particular of the Lisbon Agenda, as well as national cultural, political, strategic and security imperatives. The problem is complicated by different national traditions in social organisation, which are deeply rooted in history and which have resulted in different migration models within the EU. Moreover, what is an issue in its own right is immigration as a tool to counter the negative impact of population ageing on economic growth and the pressure on public funds. Another aspect of migration concerns the internationalisation of production and its contribution to the diversification of the productive structure of the EU and its member states. Further, migration may also contribute to the growth of the informal economy, an aspect of concern in member states with large shares of the informal sector in GDP. Yet another question to be resolved is the role of migration in the flow of trade in goods and services within an enlarged Europe and between the EU (25) and the rest of the world. The distinction between migration and trade in services (mode 4) is important for judging the impact on the labour market, as the regulatory mechanisms differ. The paper addresses all the above issues. As with employment, education and social policies, a common understanding about the impact of various possible routes of migration policies on the societies of the member states has to be obtained before entering a process of policy coordination towards eventual convergence. The paper focuses on ways in which different policies on various categories of migration - labour migration, family reunification, refugee and asylum-seeker intake - and the free movement of service providers can differentially impact the EU economy, calling for a complex mix of policy interventions to address the various socio-economic challenges emanating from them.

Globalisation and the ageing of the work force represent a dual challenge for enterprises. The first exerts pressure on production costs in order to stay competitive, the second raises production costs as the productivity of workers tends to decline after a certain age, particularly for unskilles and semiskilled workers involved in heavy physical work and where seniority-pay regimes apply. This paper looks at coping strategies of an enterprise in the automotive industry in Austria. It shows to what extent innovative and flexible organisation of work may ensure the survival of the production site in a highly developed economy, and what role public institutions play, in particular wage policy, retirement regulations and labour market policies, to keep older workers in employment. Austrian car manufacturing is a particularly interesting case as the option of outsourcing challenges the viability of Austrian production sites.

There is no simple answer to the question of the potential impact of migration on EU society. EU migration policy is expected to meet the requirements of economic and social policy, in particular of the Lisbon Agenda, as well as national cultural, political, strategic and security imperatives. The problem is complicated by different national traditions in social organisation, which are deeply rooted in history and which resulted in different migration models within the EU. As with employment, educational and social policy issues, the need to reach a common understanding about possible routes to eventual convergence, will call for coordination of the migration policies of the Member States (MS). Moreover, an issue in its own right is immigration as a tool to counter the negative impact of population ageing on economic growth and the pressure on public funds. While we know that immigration alone cannot solve the problem of population ageing, it can be an important policy instrument, complementary to other measures to raise the activity rate of older persons, and of prime age women. Its impact will depend on the level, composition and duration of inflows as well as the necessary measures which are to form an integral part of migration policy. Another aspect of migration concerns the internationalisation of production and its contribution to the diversification of the productive structure of the EU and its member states. Thus migrants impact on the supply side - the production potential of the economy - as well as on the demand side - the level and composition of consumption. Further, migration may also contribute to the growth of the informal economy, an aspect of concern in MS with high shares of the informal sector in GDP .

As the EU economies and societies become increasingly integrated, and as labour market behaviour patterns converge across borders, the EU is striving to develop a substantially common social identity. To this end, it is seeking to promote the development of a sustainable institutional framework that facilitates flexibility and structural change in the economy and the labour market, and, at the same time, to provide a meaningful social safety net ('flexicurity'). However, while there are such great differences in social organisation among EU countries, it would be unrealistic to try to establish a common social protection model. The more immediate goals for the EU should be to identify a mechanism for ensuring social protection, the developments that jeopardise the continuation of universal coverage for all members of society, the factors that are responsible for the exclusion of certain groups of people and how this is affected by different models of social organisation and, last but not least, the gaps are in the statistical data that prevent a proper evaluation of economic well-being under different welfare models. These are the questions that are addressed in this paper. The argument advanced in this paper is that the well-being of every society depends upon the interaction of the market, the household/family and the state. The exclusion of the household sector from the conventional statistical framework – and its exclusion from orthodox economic theory – ignores the fact that the various models of social organisation give different relative weights to – and impose different roles on – the three pillars of social organisation. A different set of taxes, transfer payments and public services in the various welfare models that are found in the EU leads to a divergence of incentives to the private sector and/or the household to provide social services. This results in a different degree of integration of the working age population into the labour force, the quality of work and the price and quality of social protection. Models that allow for the targeting of individual needs are best able to cope with the current trends of increasing flexibility of work and family relationships and the concomitant challenge of universal social protection.

"Der abrupte Zustrom von Kindern und Jugendlichen ins Bildungssystem im Gefolge des Zerfalls Jugoslawiens konnte vom Bildungssystem nicht ohne Schwierigkeiten bewältigt werden. Das zeigt sich unter anderem in einem merklichen Anstieg der Zahl der Gastarbeiterkinder in Sonderschulen. Die finanzielle Situation der Gastarbeiterfamilien machte es auch lange Zeit erforderlich, dass ihre Kinder so bald wie möglich einer Erwerbsarbeit nachgingen. Erst in den 1990er Jahren ist eine klare Tendenz zur Verlängerung der Ausbildung über die Pflichtschule hinaus zu erkennen. Gastarbeiterkinder bevorzugen berufsorientierte Ausbildungskanäle, insbesondere die Lehre. Der verstärkte Wettbewerbsdruck in den 1990er Jahren in Branchen und Betrieben, die Lehrlinge ausbilden bzw. bevorzugt Jugendliche mit Lehrabschluss einstellen, ist mit ein Grund, dass immer weniger Betriebe eine Lehrausbildung anbieten bzw. Lehrabsolventen weiterbeschäftigen können. Das trägt dazu bei, dass die Arbeitslosigkeit der Kinder von Gastarbeitern vergleichsweise hoch ist und die Beschäftigungschancen auch in Zukunft nicht rosig sind. Das ist auch deshalb der Fall, weil die zweite Generation häufig in den typischen Gastarbeitertätigkeiten der Eltern eine Arbeit sucht. Der Strukturwandel trägt im Zusammenwirken mit der Beibehaltung der Ausbildungsmuster der Eltern dazu bei, dass sich türkische junge Frauen verstärkt aus dem Erwerbsleben in den Haushalt zurückziehen, da ihre Beschäftigungschancen besonders ungünstig sind. Es bedarf besonderer integrationspolitischer Anstrengungen, um die Lebenschancen der Kinder von Gastarbeitern nachhaltig zu verbessern." (Autorenreferat)

Globalisation has been associated with increased international mobility of capital but less so of labour partly because of legal restrictions. In theory, labour mobility and trade are generally substitutes in respect of tradeable goods and services. There are, however, also instances of complementarity between migration and trade. The promotion of free trade and the regulation of migration suggest that trade rather than migration is the preferred instrument to promote economic growth. Empirical evidence suggests that not only political but also economic forces tend to promote international trade rather than migration in the current period of globalisation. In the course of the 1990s, labour mobility in western Europe lagged behind the growth in international trade of goods and services as industries employing a high proportion of migrants in the production of tradeable goods declined. Technological developments, the reduction in transport costs as well as catching up processes in the productive capacities of less developed trading partners, e.g., Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs), resulted in a change in the composition of production of tradeable goods. However, the composition of migrant labour by industry and skills changed little, and labour mobility lost momentum. Thus, the transfer of production of goods and services to less developed countries, in the case of the EU, CEECs, contributed to the loss of momentum in demand pull migration. Recent developments especially in communications technology, tended to promote mobility of services rather than labour mobility. As long as capital, technology and managerial skills are mobile, labour may remain in the country of origin, e.g., the case of Indian computer programmers. Physical labour mobility remains necessary only where services are linked directly to the consumers, for example, nursing or tourist services, or where a particular type of labour is linked to direct capital investment, for example, highly skilled labour which moves with multinational companies .

As the EU economies and societies become increasingly integrated, and as labour market behaviour patterns converge across borders, the EU strives to develop a substantially common social identity. To this end, it seeks to promote the development of a sustainable institutional framework which facilitates flexibility and structural change in the economy and the labour market, while at the same time providing a meaningful social safety net ("flexicurity"). However, it would be unrealistic to try to establish a common EU social protection model under the prevailing great differences in social organisation of the various EU countries. The more immediate object for the EU should be to identify the mechanism by which social protection is ensured, what developments jeopardise the continued universal coverage of all members of society, what factors are responsible for the socio-economic exclusion of groups of people, why these differ by model of social organisation, and last but not least, what the gaps are in the statistical data which prevent a proper evaluation of economic wellbeing under the different welfare models. The thrust of this paper is that the wellbeing of every society depends upon the interaction of the market, the household/family and the state. The exclusion of the household sector from the regular statistical framework - and orthodox economic theory - ignores the fact that the various models of social organisation give different relative weights to - and impose different roles on - the three pillars of social organisation. A different set of taxes, transfer payments and public services in the various welfare models in the EU results in a divergence of incentives to the private sector and/or the household to provide social services, in particular care work. This results in a different degree of integration of the working age population into the labour force, the quality of work and the price and quality of social protection. Models which allow targeting for individual needs are best able to cope with the current trends of increasing fragmentation and diversity of social functions.