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In recent years, much attention has focused on the growth of nonstandard and contingent employment (including part-time work) which involves up to 30 percent of the total U.S. labor force. There is little agreement on either the causes or the effects of this trend. Some researchers emphasize the advantages: employees may explore the job market and obtain work that does not necessarily involve rigid schedules, while employers enjoy greater flexibility and lower costs. Others point to the disadvantages for employees, such as lack of job security, fewer benefits and chances for promotion, and often lower wages. Drawbacks for employers include a workforce that has little chance to develop firm-specific knowledge or loyalty.
Chapters in Nonstandard Work: The Nature and Challenges of Emerging Employment Arrangements carefully analyze the extent and nature of various nonstandard work arrangements; their advantages and disadvantages for employees and employers; the demographic, industrial, and occupational distribution of such positions; and the question of whether standard employment itself is changing. Some contributors consider how innovative labor market intermediaries and unions might expand opportunities for workers while also helping firms to raise their productivity.
Annette Bernhardt; University of Wisconsin - Madison
Dave E. Marcotte; University of Maryland Baltimore County
Anne E. Polivka, Sharon R. Cohany, and Steven Hipple; Bureau of Labor Statistics
Philip Moss, Harold Salzman, and Chris Tilly; University of Massachusetts at Lowell
Marcello Estevao; International Monetary Fund
Saul Lach; The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and National Bureau of Economic Research
Arne L. Kalleberg and Jeremy Reynolds; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Dale Belman; Michigan State University
Lonnie Golden; Penn State University, Delaware County
Marianne A. Ferber; University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Jane Waldfogel; Columbia University School of Social Work
Shulamit Kahn; Boston University School of Management
Charles Heckscher; Rutgers University
Dorothy Sue Cobble; Rutgers University
Leah F. Vosko; McMaster University
Francoise Carre; Radcliffe Public Policy Center, Harvard University
Pamela Joshi; Brandeis University
Laura Dresser; University of Wisconsin - Madison
Chris Benner; University of California, Berkeley, and Working Partnerships USA
Amy Dean; Working Partnerships USA and South Bay AFL-CIO Central Labor Council
Virginia L. DuRivage; United Food and Commercial Workers Union
Sara Horowitz; Working Today
Stephen A. Herzenberg; The Keystone Research Center
John A. Alic; Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies
Howard Wial; General Accounting Office, United States Congress
Reviews
"The volume is characteristic of prior annual research volumes of the IRRA in that it contains a summary introduction by the editors and a mixture of empirical and theoretical pieces...This scholarly volume is recommended for upper-division undergraduate and graduate students as well as researchers."--Choice, June 2001, Vol. 38, No. 10
"Sixteen papers examine the observed decline of the standard employment relationship and the emerging new employment arrangements."--Journal of Economic Literature, September 2001
“This volume is about the decline of the standard employment relationship and the emerging new employment arrangements.”—Future Survey, 23:4, April 2001
About the Author
Françoise Carré is Research Program Director at the Radcliffe Public Policy Center. Marianne A. Ferber is Professor Emerita of Economics and Women's Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Lonnie Golden is Associate Professor of Economics at Penn State University, Delaware County. Stephen A. Herzenberg is Executive Director of the Keystone Research Center.
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