Regular Workers Research Articles

Agri-Business Curriculum: The Entrepreneurial Direction of Graduates

This study aimed to determine the entrepreneurial engagement of Agri-Business graduates from Southern Philippines Agri-Business and Marine and Aquatic School of Technology (SPAMAST), during the SY 2008-2013. The data was collected using a self-administered questionnaire, analyzed and subjected to the measures of central tendency (mean and percentage) and the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS 19.0).Results showed that graduates were within 26 to 30 years old age, female, single, most were regular workers in a private company with 1 - 3 years working experience and were practicing entrepreneurs earning a monthly income of 10,000. High rating was extended to the level of competence on attitudinal, behavioral and educational factors. It was found out that, the respondents either felt, thought and view entrepreneurship as a thing that they had dreamed to undertake after graduation because they believed that it is only doing entrepreneurial undertakings that they can fulfill the objectives of the course and their personal beliefs that success can be attained through it.Further, only few graduates had started their entrepreneurial engagement, while the majority, were still thinking about their entrepreneurial endeavor because of the difficulty in starting own business due to the complex administrative procedures involved. The demographic and socio-economic profile had no significant influence to the level of engagement while the level of competencies significantly influenced the level of entrepreneurial engagement.

Factors influencing the decision to hire contract labour by Indian manufacturing firms

ABSTRACTOver a third of workers employed in the Indian formal manufacturing sector are ‘contract’ workers – hired through the services of labour contractors, facing lower wages and no job security in relation to regular workers. We investigate the role of a variety of factors that influence the decision of employers to hire in contract workers, using information from a specially commissioned survey of manufacturing firms. While there are immediate cost advantages that tilt firms towards hiring in contract labour, a counterforce has employers favouring regular workers in firms that have a large proportion of their workforce concentrating on production activity – probably instances where long-term human capital investment by regular workers is important for the firm.Abbreviation: CLA: Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970 ASI: Annual Survey of Industries NIC: National Industrial Classification MSME: Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises SEZ: Special Economic Zone ICRIER: Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations

Optimum Production Planning Problem (A Case Study of Aspect Water Company Limited Intechiman Municipality)

All production firms aim at maximizing profit after sales of their products but due to lack of technological and scientific approach in the production setting, many cannot achieve the stated objectives. This study showed the trend of production of sachet water at AWCL which gave the quantity of sachet water produced in each month for the year, 2011. The major objective of this study is to minimize the total cost of production at AWCL using Linear Programming model. The optimal solution to the production planning problem was generated by LP Solver and the demand and supply at each month were determined. The AWCL incurs cost of GH¢1.2355 when producing a bag of sachet water but with the use of linear Programming model, the cost of producing a bag of water was reduced to GH¢0.831519. The analysis also showed that, increasing the wages of regular workers and reducing that of overtime help the company to produce more with minimum cost of production. AWCL should employ more overtime labour when it is necessary to meet the urgent demands from the customers. Instead of employing more manual labour force, the company could have used machinery that can do assembling and packaging of the sachet water. Computer – based planning (scheduling) help the manufacturers to attend to orders from their respective customers easily and to enhance on – time delivery of products. The computerized planning performs better and faster than manual scheduling tools. The analysis showed that the production planning can facilitate the production processes in a way that help the company to streamline the activities that go on during acquisition of raw materials for production and the demands from the customers could be met when the wages of regular labour force are increased. Keywords: Linear Programming Model, Optimum Production of Sachet water, LP Transportation Model DOI : 10.7176/JIEA/9-4-01 Publication date :June 30 th 2019

일본 임금정체의 요인 분석과 정책적 시사점 (What’s up with Wage Growth in Japan?)

Korean Abstract: 2012년 말부터 최근까지 일본에서는 약 400만 개의 일자리가 창출되었고 실업률도 크게 하락하는 등 고용사정은 대폭 개선되었지만 임금은 기대만큼 오르지 않고 있다. 이 보고서에서는 고용여건 개선에도 불구하고 일본에서 임금정체가 지속되고 있는 요인을 다각적으로 분석하였다. English Abstract: Beginning from the end of 2012 and up to recently, approximately 4 million new jobs have been created in Japan and the unemployment rate has fallen to the low 2% range, showing a great improvement in employment conditions. At the same time, however, the average wage level of workers remains at pre-1997 levels. In this study we analyze the reasons why wage levels remain stagnant in the Japanese economy. Our analysis reveals the following reasons. The first is a change in the composition of the Japanese workforce. Female workers, elderly workers, and non-regular workers, who on average receive lower wages, now represent a larger proportion of the workforce and employment has increased in industries with lower wage levels. For instance, the percentage of female employees has increased from 32% in 1970 to 45% recently. The shares of non-regular workers increased from 20.2% in 1990 to 37.6% as of the 1st quarter of 2018. On average, non-regular workers and part-time workers receive 67% and 75% of the wages of regular workers, respectively.

From edit distance to augmented space-time-weighted edit distance: Detecting and clustering patterns of human activities in Puget Sound region

Considering and measuring the similarity of human activities remains challenging. Existing studies of similarity measures based on traditional edit distance (ED), specifically on activity patterns, do not reflect the spatiotemporal characteristics in the measurement model. Additionally, interdependence between activities is ignored in existing multidimensional sequence alignment methods. To address the gap, we initially extend the traditional edit distance to a space-time-weighted edit distance (STW-ED). Specifically, differences in distance and time between activities are considered cost functions in the operation cost calculation (insertion, deletion, and substitution). We advance STW-ED to an augmented space-time-weighted edit distance method (ASTW-ED) that integrates an optimum-trajectory-based multidimensional sequence alignment method (OT-MDSAM) with STW-ED, treating the nonspatiotemporal dimensions as augment factors. In addition, ontology is considered for the similarity measure for nonspatiotemporal dimensions.To show the feasibility of our proposed approach, we conduct an empirical study based on an activity-based travel survey in the Puget Sound Region. Eight clusters (homemakers, regular workers with a colorful life, regular workers with a monotonous life, part-time workers, recreation travelers, senior travelers, no-job travelers, and night owl adventurers) are identified based on ASTW-ED and ontology. To cluster the similarity matrix derived from the introduced methods, the affinity propagation (AP) clustering method is employed because it is free of prior knowledge for clustering and can produce exemplars of the clusters. The empirical study indicates that, relative to existing methods for multidimensional activity similarity measurement and clustering, ASTW-ED performs better in terms of within-group homogeneity and between-group heterogeneity of clusters. In addition, the results reveal that ontology can improve clustering performance if it is considered for nonspatiotemporal dimensions provide better understanding of human behavior for urban governance..

Stakeholders’ Perspective on the Implementation of Train Law in Cebu City, Philippines

The Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) is the principal bundle of the Comprehensive Tax Reform Program (CTRP) imagined by the Duterte organization to address insufficiencies in the duty framework making it less complicated, more pleasant, and a progressively proficient assessment framework yet draws heap of responses from different segments in the economy especially the shoppers and the regular workers. This study assessed the effect of the imposition of TRAIN Law as viewed by the various sectors in the local economy of Cebu City specifically from four sectors: non-working, employees from the public, employees from private, and micro-entrepreneurs. This study employed a descriptive method of research using a researcher-made questionnaire. The respondents comprising of the non-working sector, the employee from the public sector, the employee from the private sector, and micro-entrepreneurs. It was conducted in Cebu City with 20 villages that were surveyed using a random sampling method. Frequency, simple percentage, weighted mean, Chi-square test of independence, and ANOVA were used to treat the gathered data.The study revealed that the effect on the imposition of TRAIN Law towards the consumers was moderately evident in terms of the affordability of the necessary goods and services, social overhead capital and infrastructure, and the development of micro-enterprises, while in terms of the affordability of non-essential commodities and disposable income, the effect or impact as only slightly evident. It was concluded that despite the assessment on the full effect of TRAIN in various dimensions of the economy is still premature since the implementation was still at the first package; the people still perceived that there is already an apparent improvement in the delivery of public services and infrastructures.

Employment conditions and use of gastric cancer screening services in Korea: a nationwide survey

BackgroundAlthough it is well known that employment conditions exert considerable effects on health and health equity, the association between employment conditions and the use of preventative health services has rarely been studied. We explored whether inequities in the use of preventative services were associated with employment conditions. We used gastric cancer screening as a surrogate for the use of preventative health services.MethodsThe study population was derived from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Survey IV (2007–2009), which included data on 5626 individuals over 40 years of age. Employment conditions were grouped by employment status, work hours, employment contract term, and salary source. Participants who had undergone gastroscopy or an upper gastrointestinal series within the past 2 years were considered to have used cancer screening services according to the National Cancer Screening Program guidelines. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated using multiple logistic regression analysis. As the survey procedure incorporated sample weights, we adjusted our calculations to consider the complex sample design.ResultsSelf-employed workers were less likely to participate in regular cancer screening than were wage workers (OR = 0.79, 95% CI = 0.68–0.92), and part-time workers were less likely to participate than were full-time workers (OR = 0.81, 95% CI = 0.67–0.99). Among wage workers, temporary workers and daily workers exhibited lower participation rates than did regular workers (OR = 0.81, 95% CI = 0.63–1.05 and OR = 0.58, 95% CI = 0.44–0.76, respectively). Dispatched workers also exhibited lower participation rates (OR = 0.45, 95% CI = 0.25–0.80).ConclusionsWe found obvious inequities in the use of preventative health services associated with various employment conditions. Self-employed, irregular, and dispatched workers were significantly less likely to participate in cancer screening than were other workers. Political efforts should be made to reduce employment insecurity and to improve participation in preventative screening services by vulnerable employees so as to resolve the evident health inequities.

Alcohol use disorder and health-related quality of life in Korean night-shift workers: A cross-sectional study using the KNHANES 2007-2015 data.

This study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of night-shift work, and the association of night-shift work with alcohol use disorders(AUDs), as well as with health-related quality of life(HRQL), in Korean adult workers. A total of 26,895 adult workers aged 20–59 years were included in the analysis. AUDs were assessed using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test(AUDIT), and HRQL was measured by the EuroQol-5D questionnaire with five main dimensions. We found an interaction effect between gender and working status on AUDs (p = 0.0065), suggesting that women are more fragile than men in terms of the effects of night work but not regarding HRQL (p = 0.1729). Female night workers had higher risk of AUDs than female day workers (odds ratio(OR): 2.23, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.48–3.38) but this effect was not noted in male night workers (OR: 0.97, 95% CI: 0.69–1.37). Lower HRQL was found in depression dimension for night workers compared to day workers (OR: 1.37, 95% CI: 1.00–1.89), whereas day-night regular shift workers were protected from depression. Risk of AUDs and lower HRQL were identified in female night workers but not in male night workers. This association suggests that women are more fragile than men in terms of the effects of night work.

Factors Affecting Dental Utilization and Dental Expenses in the Economically Active Population: Based on the 2010∼2014 Korea Health Panel Data

Background: The health of the economically active population contributes to increased corporate productivity by reducing the productivity loss caused by disease and increasing job efficiency, which in turn is a national benefit. Since the economically active population is a concept encompassing workers and a source of economic development for a country, that population’s health should be treated with importance not only from a personal standpoint but also at a national level. Methods: In this study, data of 11,007 adults aged 20 years and older who participate in economic activities were analyzed in the five-year Korea Health Panel Study from 2010 to 2014 including the number of dental visits and dental medical expenses. Results: Factors related to “gender,” “education level,” “age,” “duty category,” “income level,” “employment type,” “national health insurance,” and “chronic disease status” of the economically active population are affected in relation to the number of visits and dental medical expenses. The number of dental visits increased with higher education levels (p＜0.001), and the number of visits to the dentist increased with older age (p ＜0.001). Dental medical expenses were 91,806 Korean won (KRW) more for “white-collar workers” than for “blue-collar workers” (p＜0.03), and 127,674 KRW more for “regular workers” than for “atypical workers” (p＜0.02). Conclusion: When it is necessary to improve policies to enhance the efficiency of the distribution of health and medical resources in the overall balance of the dental health sector, we should try to identify various factors of oral health disorder due to income inequality among the classes according to the country’s employment type in order to find ways to reduce the health gap among the social classes.

North-North migration of care workers: “Disposable” au pairs in Australia

ABSTRACT This paper examines the north-north migration of care workers within the industrialised world. While care migration has traditionally been conceptualised as a phenomenon of women moving from the global south to the global north, a growing number of youths are now providing care and domestic services in other industrialised countries as au pairs. Their ambiguous legal status, the rhetoric of being ‘part of the family’ and limited language proficiency compound their vulnerability. We argue that the current Australian government’s policy can be interpreted as a deliberate strategy to increase the supply of care labour and lower the care costs. This policy signifies a shift from commodification of care which involves formal transactions of wage and labour provision to what we call ‘pseudo-familialisation of care’ which pushes care provision back to the family where the actual work is shouldered by ‘pseudo-family members’ who are neither family members nor regular workers. The institutional environment for au pairs from the global north in Australia is more fragile than that for migrant care workers from the global south. The lack of institutional assistance from governments and civil society organisations on both sending and receiving ends as well as their limited co-ethnic community support place them in a vulnerable situation.

Short-term contracts and their effect on wages in Indian regular wage employment

The increase in regular wage employment in the Indian economy between 2004–2005 and 2011–2012 was accompanied by a significant deterioration in job security; more workers found themselves on short-term and insecure contracts – a continuing trend. Insecurity of tenure results in a significant wage penalty for short-term workers, compared with those with longer term contracts. This article estimates the negative effect of short-term contracts on the wages of Indian regular wage workers all along the income distribution – unlike earlier studies – using the method of unconditional quantile regressions on data from the 68th round and the 61st round of the National Sample Survey Organisation on Employment covering the period 2004–2005 and 2011–2012. It finds that the wage penalty due to short-term contracts is higher for high-wage workers than for low-wage workers, with the maximum impact felt by median wage workers, and has increased for higher paid workers from 2004–2005 to 2011–2012. The spread of informal employment arrangements within India’s formal labour markets has resulted in an increasingly unequal distribution of workers’ access to the benefits of growth, reflecting a shift in power in favour of capital. These findings, specific to a developing economy like India, stand in contrast with studies in European countries, where high-wage workers do not face as much of a penalty for short-term contract work as low-wage workers. JEL Codes: J31, J41

Strategies, Struggles, and Sites of Transformation in Korean Political Economy

Strategies, Struggles, and Sites of Transformation in Korean Political Economy

불리한 처우 유무 판단을 위한 비교방식과 합리적 이유 판단의 조화

It has been more than 10 years since the introduction of the system of discrimination correction since the implementation of the law.BRThere have been a lot of achievements in the past, and many homeworks still remain unresolved.BR It is a positive part that the detailed issues are sorted out by each judgment step to finally judge the discriminative treatment and it is polished more politically.BR However, there are still a lot of trial and error that are common in the course of institutionalization.BR One of such problems is the disagreement between the disadvantaged comparison method and the rational reason judgment. The categorization comparison method can be regarded as a very useful comparative method in which judgments are refined to judge the adverse treatment.BR However, this is only a tool for objectively confirming unfavorable treatment, and it should not affect the stage of judging whether there is reasonable reason or not.BR In general, there are considerable differences in the content, scope, authority and responsibility of the work of irregular workers and regular workers. It does not deny the difference.BR However, focusing only on the degree of difference in the amount and quality of benefits rather than on the nature of the benefits, the nature of the benefits would also result in the discrimination of the non-regular workers as well as the benefits to be paid.

When Coalition Falls Apart: Case of Solidarity Building of Two Unions

This article examines the external and organizational factors behind the coalition dynamics of two labour unions representing a different mix of employment contract types – temporary and permanent – that led the 2007 Irregular Workers Movement in South Korea. Drawing on semi-structured interview, video, newspapers and internal document data, we find that while political opportunities drove the two unions to come together, broad alliances formed around the coalition on the issue of job security of irregular workers marginalized the union with predominantly regular workers. Organizational differences that seemed complementary at first hindered a collective identity from forming and became a source of resentment as strikes continued on. Varying progression of negotiations not only reduced the benefits of claims coordination and collective action but also invoked otherness among them. Lack of trust and recognition did not allow for even a loose cooperative differentiation relation.

Industrial associations as ideational platforms: why Japan resisted American-style shareholder capitalism

Significant wage and treatment differentials between regular workers in long-term employment and precarious non-regular workers have been a major political issue in Japan since the mid-1990s. I argue this phenomenon was caused by Japanese society’s resistance to American neoliberal hegemony. Why has Japan resisted it, and how has the resistance resulted in the rapid increase in the working poor? I contend anti-liberal, anti-free market norms of Japanese society centred on ‘systemic support’ have bolstered resistance to convergence in order to prevent capitalist dominance from severing long-term social ties, such as management-labour cooperation. My broadened definition of systemic support incorporates dominant elites’ support and protection of subordinates in exchange for their loyalty and obedience. This paper will explore reasons for the resistance to convergence by examining an ideational conflict within Japanese elites between the market liberalisation and anti-free market camps, particularly between two major industrial associations, Keidanren and Keizai Doyukai, which have played a key role as ‘ideational platforms’ for Japanese corporate society. Under the Hashimoto (1996-8) and Koizumi (2001-6) administrations, the market liberalisation camp gained influence, but since 2006, both the anti-free market camp and its subordinates (e.g. regular workers) have driven anti-neoliberal backlash.

The End of Sitting: How middle-aged employees use and experience a new activity-inducing office over time

Rietveld-Architecture-Art-Affordances acknowledged the public health concern of sitting too much and developed The End of Sitting—a workspace without chairs that provides a variety of supported standing positions. In the current study middle-aged office workers were to use the End of Sitting for one hour per week over a ten-week period. Over time, participants reduced their changes between locations in one session while working, yet they still worked in different locations and postures at the final work sessions. In addition, we found that the self-reported office task performance (concentration, quality of work, productivity), mood (energized, well-being, pleasantness) and postural comfort were not negatively affected by working in this new office environment compared to their conventional workplace. This indicates that the End of Sitting should be taken seriously as an alternative office for regular office workers.

Convergence Study on the Stress Response and Life Satisfaction of a Workplace Worker -Focused on Regular and Non Regular worker-

Background/Objectives: The purpose of this study is to compare the stress response and the satisfaction of life to regular workers and non - regular workers.Method/Statistical Analysis: Data collection was conducted from July 1 to 31, 2017 for 600 workers of K company. Analysis was performed using the SPSS 23.0 version program and analyzed by ?2-test, t-test, ANCOVA and Pearson’s correlation coefficient.Findings: The results showed that the stress response was higher in the irregular workers than in the regular workers (f=11.09, ?=.001). In the stress response, the irregular workers showed higher somatic symptoms (f=6.18, ?=.013), depression (f=13.70, ?=.001) and anger (f=6.15, ?=.013) than the regular workers. Stress response and life satisfaction showed significant negative correlation (r= -. 387, ? <.001).Improvements/Applications: Workplaces need to pay attention not only to regular workers but also to the stress of non-regular workers, and to programs that improve their life satisfaction and alleviate stress reactions.

Analysis of the Effect of the Elderly's Labor Status on Care Cost at the End of Life.

This study quantitatively analyzes the effects of employment patterns at the time of death of the elderly on the utilization of medical care before death using the cohort data from the National Health Insurance Corporation, controlling mortality to obtain more accurate results. Gender was coded as 0 for males and 1 for females, and average monthly household income was taken as a logarithm to approximate a normal distribution. Care cost at the end of life was defined as the sum of the national health insurance contributions and statutory self-contributions. To measure proximity to death, deceased elderly were divided by the period from last hospital visit to death (except any hospital visit at time of death). We distinguished regular workers, irregular workers, self-employed and employers, unpaid family workers, and unemployed. The data used in this study are sample cohort data from the National Health Insurance Corporation. We examined the relationships between variables through 4 models using negative binomial regression. The effects of employment status on health status were analyzed and adjusted for demographic characteristics, socioeconomic status, and proximity to death. As the dependent variable, medical expenses were taken for 1 year before death. In this study, care costs at end of life were higher when children were economically independent and when the respondent was more educated, had high economic level, and had high average monthly household income. In addition, employment security also had a significant impact on care cost at end of life: Irregular workers spent significantly less than regular workers. The fact that care cost at end of life is differentiated according to employment status suggests that individuals’ health exists within a social context, which may also constrain it: There is a risk that people’s health status will become determined by socioeconomic status.

УЛИЦА РУБИНШТЕЙНА КАК СОЦИАЛЬНО-КУЛЬТУРНЫЙ ФЕНОМЕН: ОСОБЕННОСТИ ОРГАНИЗАЦИИ И ПРИЧИНЫ ПОПУЛЯРНОСТИ

The paper dwells upon barhopping as a part of St. Petersburg urban culture, on an example of Rubinshteina Street. Barhopping is a fullfledged part of modern urban culture. The paper presents the results of a research in which Rubinsteina Street in St. Petersburg was studied in terms of symbolic interpretation of alcohol-related practices. This street was considered a cultural sample, kind of cultural layer, which has its own rules, structure, integral elements and atmosphere. The objectives of this work were to describe and explain the phenomena of Rubinsteina Street; to establish the main factors affecting the popularity of the street among residents and visitors of St. Petersburg; to study the internal structure and distinctive features of the street; to provide a symbolic interpretation of alcohol-related practices on Rubinsteina Street. Within the framework of the research, T. Veblen’s theory of conspicuous consumption and M. Bakhtin’s theory of the culture of popular laughter were implemented. In accordance with the research objectives, our methods included observation, photographic observation and a series of expert interviews with regular patrons and workers of Rubinsteina Street bars. Also, a content analysis of social networks was conducted to analyze the phenomena of popularity of Rubinshteina Street from the perspective of symbolization of alcohol-related practices. The results of the research were then analyzed and presented in thematic blocks.

Working Time Society consensus statements: Psychosocial stressors relevant to the health and wellbeing of night and shift workers

This consensus report summarizes the negative impact of work-related psychosocial factors and job stressors on the health and wellbeing of shift workers. Psychosocial factors may (a) directly affect work schedules or (b) mediate or moderate relationships between work schedules, circadian factors, and health. In this paper, prominent psychosocial models (e.g. Job Strain and Effort-Reward Imbalance) are used to help assess detrimental effects, including pathophysiologic outcomes. Several studies indicate the psychosocial environment can be more problematic for shift workers compared to regular day workers. This is likely due to shift worker’s experiencing greater risks of low job control, high physical work demands, lower support from supervisors, and greater levels of over-commitment. Workplace violence is another frequently encountered psychosocial stressor for shift workers more likely to be in regular contact with the general public, such as police officers, security personnel, professional drivers, and other service employees being at elevated risk. A large body of literature confirms night and irregular shift schedules increase risk for injury. Non-diurnal schedules can trigger and worsen such incidents, especially under unsafe conditions. The problem of workplace violence for shift workers, in terms of severity and consequences, is probably underestimated, especially when present among other occupational stressors. Practical considerations and recommendations for action to mitigate the detrimental effects of psychosocial stressors on night and shift workers are presented.