| 1. |
- Andersson, Monica, et al.
(author)
-
Determining wages in Europe's SMEs : how relevant are the trade unions?
- 2007
-
In: Transfer - European Review of Labour and Research. - : Sage Publications. - 1024-2589 .- 1996-7284. ; 13:1, s. 55-73
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This article discusses wage setting in SMEs in eight European countries, how wage setting in small firms differs from that in larger firms and how trade unions address the issue. The context is the increased decentralisation of wage setting. Wage setting is analysed at four different levels: the workplace, the regional, the industry and the national level. The main finding is that trade unions’ ability to secure higher wages for workers in SMEs depends not upon workplace organisation, but upon well functioning industrial relations institutions. That is, if workers in SMEs earn less than employees inlarger companies, this is due not to the size of the company but to the absence of a comprehensive collective bargaining system that encompasses SMEs.
|
|
| 2. |
- Berglund, Tomas, 1967, et al.
(author)
-
Editorial and Introduction
- 2022
-
In: Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research. - : SAGE Publications. - 1024-2589 .- 1996-7284. ; 28:2, s. 157-163
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)
|
|
| 3. |
|
|
| 4. |
|
|
| 5. |
- Furåker, Bengt, 1943
(author)
-
European trade union cooperation, union density and employee attitudes to unions
- 2020
-
In: Transfer-European Review of Labour and Research. - : SAGE Publications. - 1024-2589 .- 1996-7284. ; 36:3, s. 345-358
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- European trade unions have much to gain from cooperating with each other. Such cooperation does exist, but it is still fairly limited and many obstacles need to be overcome if cooperation is to be improved. According to our survey data, higher-level union officials regard differences concerning financial resources and national labour market regulations to be particularly substantial barriers to cooperation. The enormously varying union density across Europe, and its general decrease, also creates barriers. Therefore, employee attitudes to unions are examined using data from the International Social Survey Programme. As expected, union members tend to be more positive about trade unions than non-members. The most interesting finding, however, is that employees in some countries with low union density exhibit fairly positive views or at least views that are not less positive than what we find among employees in many countries with higher density rates. This suggests that there is potential for recruiting members.
|
|
| 6. |
|
|
| 7. |
- Furåker, Bengt, 1943
(author)
-
The Swedish wage-earner funds and economic democracy: is there anything to be learned from them?
- 2016
-
In: Transfer - European Review of Labour and Research. - : SAGE Publications. - 1024-2589 .- 1996-7284. ; 22:1, s. 121-132
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In 1983, the Social Democratic government in Sweden proposed that wage-earner funds should be implemented in the country and this proposal was adopted by parliament. The reform was initiated by LO, the large blue-collar trade union, and had been debated for more than a decade. Its purpose was to develop economic democracy, counteract the concentration of capital ownership but also to increase collective savings and supply capital for investments. When a coalition government, led by the conservatives, took office in 1991, the wage-earner funds were abolished. It is unlikely that this type of reform will reappear on the Swedish political agenda in the foreseeable future. Nonetheless, collective funds of some kind might be a way to start dealing with the lack of economic democracy and the unequal distribution of capital. In light of the Swedish experience with wage-earner funds, this article discusses some issues related to such a strategy.
|
|
| 8. |
- Furåker, Bengt, 1943, et al.
(author)
-
Trade Union Cooperation on Statutory Minimum Wages? A Study of Europan Trade Union Positions
- 2013
-
In: Transfer - European Review of Labour and Research. - 1024-2589. ; 19:4, s. 507-520
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Legislation on minimum wages exists in most EU Member States, but European trade unions have very different views on it. Nordic unions are especially negative, whereas many other union organizations are strongly positive. The present article examines these differences, explores how they can be understood and discusses their possible consequences for transnational union cooperation on issues related to statutory minimum wages. It is primarily based on survey and interview data
|
|
| 9. |
- Kallaste, Epp, et al.
(author)
-
Negotiated responses to the crisis in the Baltic countries
- 2013
-
In: Transfer - European Review of Labour and Research. - : Sage Publications. - 1024-2589 .- 1996-7284. ; 19:2, s. 253-266
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This article reviews the negotiated responses to the crisis at different levels of social dialogue in the Baltic countries. The Baltic countries form a relatively coherent group of small open economies that can be classified as belonging to the neoliberal type of central and eastern European capitalism. Their responses to the crisis were consistent with such classification: flexible labour markets absorbed the main impacts of the crisis through rapid increases in unemployment, as well as nominal and real drops in wages. A negotiated response was either not sought at all by governments or was of minor importance at all levels of interaction between the social partners. If anything, national-level social dialogue deteriorated, remaining at a low level even after the crisis had peaked. Based on qualitative examples from Estonia and Lithuania we show that, at company level, responses to the crisis varied.
|
|
| 10. |
- Kjellberg, Anders
(author)
-
The Swedish Ghent system and trade unions under pressure
- 2009
-
In: Transfer - European Review of Labour and Research. - 1024-2589. ; 15:3-4, s. 481-504
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In January 2007 the Swedish centre-right government in office since September 2006 raised considerably fees for union unemployment funds. Union membership (fund membership included) therefore suddenly became much more expensive. Trade unions lost 8% of their members over two years and union density fell by 6 percentage points (from 77% in 2006 to 71% in 2008), while unemployment funds were hit by a still larger decline. In 2008, fund fees were more closely linked to the rate of unemployment among the members of each fund. The result was a marked social polarisation of fund fees, in 2009 further sharpened by accelerating unemployment. In addition to describing the consequences of the government policy, this article discusses the ambition of the government to influence wage formation by remodelling the Swedish Ghent system.
|
|
