More than 400 million new jobs are necessary until the year 2015, to keep up with the growth of the global labour market. Accordingly the economies have to create more than 43 million new jobs each year, to confront unemployment. This is the result of a study of the ILO (International Labour Organization).
Corresponding to the study the increasing globalization brings on the one hand great opportunities and growing uncertainty on the other hand.
More and more people have the feeling that work as part of human dignity has been devalued that the prevailing economic thinking considers them merely as a production factor, as goods, and ignores the importance of human work for the individual, family, community and State. The dialog between states, employers and employees on the importance and consequences of these changes is an important basis for the ILO to formulate their political agenda.
The liberalization of trade and capital and the incredible improvements in communication and transportation lead to the fact that more and more workers offer their manpower in the competitive global labour market. Nevertheless half of the potential workers in the world can not participate and work in absolute poverty, ignored by the globalisation. Countries dependent of agriculture did not profit from globalisation. The real wages of untrained workers are regressive. And in many industrialized countries is the feeling of insecurity growing.
The dramatic change in the world of labour however has the potential to create humane jobs for everybody. Higher economic growth can lead to a higher demand for labour. An essential requirement for fighting against unemployment is a form of growth that prefers labour. Economic incentives must be set to prefer work instead of capital. Additionally an increasing productivity of the poorest workers of the world is important to guarantee them higher salaries and better working conditions.
April 18, 2009 at 12:57 pm
i like that this article is trying to look on the globalization from two points of view. it is more objective then and i agree.
in general however, i regard globalization as a positive feature of modern world. when the national labour markets become parts of the Global labour market, for me it means some kind of bigger closure of the countries. And when the countries “work together” (thanks to the dialogue between them) it leads to better relationships and no wars
i know, it is very, very simplyfied of course. also the increase of competition may lead to reductions of inequities on the market.
on the other hand, i regard as crucial to try to include developing countries as much as it is possible. if the world wants to work on the sustainable development, it is necessary to take these countries into consideration.
June 2, 2009 at 12:14 pm
I agree with bikulka. I think that Globalization in general is a positive and useful development. Nevertheless all countries should work together by considering also development countries and to avoid that there situation becomes worse. Especially when talking about price competition it is important to consider the circumstances in which the products where produced and do not accept e.g. products which were made by children.
June 3, 2009 at 9:26 am
The issue “globalization and Labour Market” is really a difficult one.. since most of the countries do not have the free mobility to some countries and get jobs.But for the products this mobility exists.. It seems like one part of the world is regionalised and trying to globalized through production.. and that s not the all job; think about Africa: how to integrate these countries? I think before we digest Globalization we will have “a new concept”.