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Canada has recently emerged as a hotspot in a burgeoning global surrogacy bio‐economy. On the grounds that any commercial trade in reproductive capabilities would result in the exploitation of marginalised women willing to sell their eggs and wombs, Canada's Assisted Human Reproduction Act (AHRA) bans commercial surrogacy, allowing only for altruistic arrangements. Drawing together analysis of the AHRA and related legal, regulatory, and policy documents, feminist political economic theory, and a growing body of critical social scientific scholarship on surrogacy, this paper troubles altruism as a means of insulating surrogacy from market‐based exploitation. It contributes to the extant literature an explicit focus on the law as a key site in the reproduction of the gendered division of labour. Acknowledging the serious concerns that dog commercial markets in reproductive biology, it argues that the legal constitution of gestational work as altruistic is part of a broader juridico‐economic apparatus that has systematically devalued reproductive labour under capitalism. Efforts to insulate surrogacy from the market by legally designating it as a gift freely given facilitate the ongoing appropriation of reproductive labour, which is assigned, once again, to the realm of non‐value. A feminist political‐economic critique of altruism, this paper does not forward an argument in favour of commercialisation. Rather, its aim is to upend the commercial/altruistic binary that has circumscribed so much of the thinking and legislating around surrogacy. This paper explores the role of the law in devaluing reproductive labour under capitalism. It does so via an examination of Canada's burgeoning surrogacy bio‐economy and the legislation – the Assisted Human Reproduction Act – designed to regulate it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Foreign workers holding H‐1B visas gained recourse to federal employment rights under the Immigration & Nationality Act (INA) for the very first time when Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1990 (IMMACT90). This paper examines H‐1B employment rights enforcement under the INA as it has intersected with broader features of the American legal system: what political scientists call judicial retrenchment and the quasi‐judicial state. I first show how H‐1B rights, already limited by the domestic politics that shaped the IMMACT, became subject to judicial retrenchment when the federal courts confined H‐1B disputes under the INA to the quasi‐judicial state at the Department of Labor (DOL). I then use published data on DOL investigation outcomes, published and unpublished administrative case records, and judicial cases reviewing agency action to examine the extent to which and how H‐1B workers can use the quasi‐judicial state to solve workplace problems. My empirical findings contribute to a new understanding of the relationship between rights retrenchment, the judiciary, and the rise of alternatives to court in immigration and employment law and point to possible fine‐grained changes for future immigration reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Housekeeping and sanitary workers are crucial for the functional efficiency and hygiene of healthcare facilities. In India, women from oppressed castes and backward classes are predominantly recruited in these occupations. The work, regarded as "polluting," is stigmatized, devalued, and lies at the historical and sociocultural intersections of caste, class, and gender. In the context of the COVID‐19 pandemic, this paper utilizes the concepts of "feminization of labor" and "care ethics" to read caste into an intersectional theoretical analysis of the organization of marginalized women's labor in such essential, yet invisibilized healthcare work. An exploratory narrative review of literature focusing exclusively on marginalized healthcare housekeepers and sanitation workers in India is undertaken and supplemented with a critical analysis of labor laws and policies to trace the sustained reproduction of the caste‐based sexual division of labor in these occupations. I propose that their exploitative terms and conditions are sustained by what I refer to as the "feminine caste contract" – a complex sociopolitical and legal arrangement of precarious, casteist, and gendered work conditions. Recognizing the exploitation inherent in this contract, recommendations are made for social work education and practice to play a key role in restructuring marginalized women's labor in essential care work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: How large are worker flows in a country where only 43% of the working age population are in employment? Rather surprisingly, the answer is that worker flows in South Africa are relatively large. In this paper, worker and job flows are estimated using anonymised IRP5 tax certificate data from the South African Revenue Service. The data used in this paper is from the 2011–2014 tax years and contains information on more than 12 million individuals and nearly 300,000 firms. The main finding of the paper is that worker flows are substantial, around 53% per year, or 58% when employers classified as engaged in “public administration” are excluded. One interpretation of this finding, as well as the patterns of separations and hires by firm growth rates, is that the labour market is not as rigid as had previously been thought. Worker flows are declining in firm size and in median earnings in the firm, they vary substantially by industry and are very low in the public sector. There is heterogeneity in worker experiences – while flows are high on average there are many workers that have very stable employment but those workers in the bottom quintile have worker flows more than three times those in the top quintile. Heterogeneity and persistence in worker flows and churning in firms are important – some firms have high levels of churning whilst others have much lower levels. Measurement error in the data about period employed from the IRP5 tax certificates is a concern but as far as can be ascertained this does not seem to be responsible for creating higher worker and job flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are markets in developing and transition economies overregulated or under-regulated? This is a perennial question in the development discourse, but one for which answers appear to come more from preset ideology than from context- specific analysis and evidence. These issues become even more pressing when the debate turns to the links between regulation, deregulation and inequality. The recent experience of rising inequality in many countries has also brought to the fore predictable policy positions. A key aspect of labor regulation in developing countries, and one becoming more prominent in the era of rising inequality, is the minimum wage. The range of issues around regulation, minimum wage and informality was addressed by papers presented to a conference held in New Delhi on December 17-18, 2014. The conference was co-sponsored by the World Bank, UK Department for International Development, Cornell University and Columbia University. The organizers of the conference were Kaushik Basu, Stefan Dercon, Ravi Kanbur and Jan Svejnar. A selection of papers from the conference which passed the usual review procedures of the Review of Development Economics, and a further selection of papers from those submitted to the journal, form this symposium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have largely interrogated the challenges of workforce casualisation in Nigeria with sparse attention to the reactions of the trade unions to this work arrangement. The paper, therefore, explores the survival strategies of trade union to employment casualisation in the Nigerian beverage sector. It explores the narratives of trade union relevance amidst increased informalisation, and the efficacy of its strategies. The Marxist conflict theory was employed as a theoretical leaning to understand labour unions' position in contending with management exploitations in the workplace. A total of 12 trade union officials were selected for interviews through purposive and convenient sampling. The study found a diminishing trade union relevance with the increasing spate of informalisation, while the collective bargaining strategy of the union was hardly utilised in addressing employment casualisation, although education and (re)training programmes show a positive outlook. The study takes the position for a review of the Nigerian labour laws, specifically the Trade Union Act of 2005 as amended, as no provisions in this legislation give recognition to casual employment, an act that is further hampering trade unions' strategic effort in ensuring a decent workplace for all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing literature seeks to establish a relationship between India's supposedly "restrictive" labour laws and its poor performance on a range of industrial and social indicators. After providing an overview of this literature, this article shows that multiple errors were made in the foundational papers that constructed indices measuring interstate differences in labour regulation. These indices were then misinterpreted as measures of labour market flexibility. The literature is also marred by econometric problems and by difficulties involved in replicating the analysis with corrected and updated indices. The author concludes by summarizing evidence of deteriorating labour market outcomes for workers in Indian manufacturing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT This paper examines whether health shocks influence labour supply. Estimates rely on detailed health measures that not only are more homogeneous than commonly-used self-reported health measures, but they also can be interpreted as plausibly exogenous with respect to labour supply. Further, this paper investigates the unique role that certain fringe benefits, namely health insurance and paid sick leave, play in the link between health shocks and subsequent employment activity. Results show that, compared to commonly-used self-reported measures of health, health problems defined by the US government as 'priority' conditions correlate with smaller labour supply shifts, but non-work-related injuries lead to larger shifts. Second, the arrival of a health shock appears to reduce the probability of remaining employed full time, while also increasing the likelihood of quitting work. Relatively few full-time workers who acquire health problems switch to part-time employment. Third, in the event of a health shock, sick leave appears to facilitate reductions in employment activities, while employer-provided insurance appears to hinder such adjustments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the interaction of legal norms and social norms in the regulation of work and working relations, observing that, with the contraction of collective bargaining, this is a matter that no longer attracts the attention that it deserves. Drawing upon two concepts from sociology – Max Weber's 'labour constitution' and Seymour Martin Lipset's 'occupational community' – it focuses on possibilities for the emergence, within groups of workers, of shared normative beliefs concerning 'industrial justice' (Selznick); for collective solidarity and agency; for the transformation of shared beliefs into legally binding norms; and for the enforcement of those norms. If labour law is currently in 'crisis', then a promising route out of the crisis, we argue, is for the law to recover its procedural focus, facilitating and encouraging these processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the first estimates of the returns to formal labor market experience and tenure in a developing country context. We take advantage of rich matched employer–employee data from Brazil and Chile, exploiting job displacement as a source of identification. We find positive returns to both dimensions in these countries, with larger returns to tenure in Brazil and larger returns to experience in Chile. Our findings suggest the more rigid Brazilian labor legislation may encourage firms to invest in young workers' specific skills. Chile's institutions, on the contrary, might promote the acquisition of general skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analysis of UK employment and labour law is often characterised by a curious dissonance. The overarching narrative mandates that labour law is a countervailing force to the inequality of bargaining power, embedded with values and assumptions concerning the nature of employment relations and the role of labour law. And yet, labour law jurisprudence tends to treat with respect, and seeks to decipher, abstract statutory concepts and tests derived from judicial pronouncements as if they were, indeed, a 'brooding omnipresence in the sky'. This paper seeks to bridge that gap, by offering a legal realist account of the legal doctrine that governs the employment of agency workers, focusing on the 'necessity' and 'sham' tests. It assesses the legitimacy of importing legal tests from one (commercial) context to another (employment) context; questions the courts' protestations that their use is mandated by precedent; and outlines the real implications for the status and rights of agency workers in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governance in the developing world is fraught with problems of corruption, weak institutions, and inadequate expertise among bureaucrats. Failing to enforce laws and regulations is one way in which these problems manifest themselves. In this paper, we evaluate changes across three institutions charged with oversight or administration of labor justice in Mexico. We find that both autonomy from the executive and professionalization are necessary to improve compliance with labor law over time. Our study shows that professionalization can occur in several ways, including through training, merit hiring, and introducing experienced external administrators. The implications of the study are that reforms that increase the independence and legal authority of oversight institutions should be complemented by efforts to strengthen the professionalism of bureaucrats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper provides novel evidence on the effect of deregulating overtime hours restrictions on women by using the 1985 Amendments to the Labour Standards Act (LSA) in Japan as a natural experiment. The original LSA of 1947 prohibited women from working overtime exceeding two hours a day; six hours a week; and 150 hours a year. The 1985 Amendments exempted a variety of occupations and industries from such an overtime restriction on women. Applying a difference‐in‐difference model to census data, we find causal evidence pointing to the positive effect of this particular piece of labour market deregulation on the proportion of female employment. We then carry out a series of sensitivity analyses to ensure the robustness of our finding. Especially, we conduct a falsification test and an event study to show that our causal inference is not threatened by the differential pretreatment trends. Finally, we use quantile regressions and find that for jobs with more rapidly growing proportion of female employment, the effect of the exemption from the overtime work restriction on women is larger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper provides difference-in-differences estimates suggesting that Latin American countries that signed a free trade agreement with the United States experienced an increase in the number of labor inspectors and inspections. We also find large heterogeneity across signers and no evidence that the North American Free Trade Agreement ( NAFTA) had a positive impact on Mexico. We conclude by suggesting that the stringency of content of the accord and the resources devoted by the U.S. government to increase enforcement make a difference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do more flexible labor market regulations reduce informal employment in formal firms? This paper examines the effects of changes in labor regulations on the incidence of formal employment. Using the case of Egypt, we study the effects of the introduction of more flexible labor regulations in 2003 on the probability that non-contractual workers will be granted a formal employment contract. To identify the effect of the law and control for potential confounding factors, we use a difference-in-difference estimator that measures the difference in the pre- and post-law probability of obtaining a formal contract across a treatment group of non-contractual workers initially employed in formal firms and a comparison group of non-contractual workers initially employed in informal firms. The latter serve as a useful comparison group since informal firms are unlikely to formalize as a result of the law, so that the only way their workers can become formal is to move to another firm. Our findings show that the passage of the new labor law did in fact increase the probability of transitioning to formal employment for noncontractual workers employed in formal firms by about 3-3.5 percentage points, or the equivalent of at least a fifth of informal workers in formal firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For the last decade, a large contingent of manufacturing firms in developmental zones on China's coast has moved to inland provinces. What are the implications of this move inland for Chinese workers? Research on labor conditions in the current period of economic globalization and mobile capital debates the existence of a 'race to the bottom' in labor standards through the pressures of international capital mobility. These theories predict that as inland China develops and attracts a larger amount of foreign and domestic capital, inland governments will compete by offering cheap labor and lower or unenforced standards. Our argument in this paper is contrarian in that we propose the possibility of a positive relationship between the movement inland and labor conditions. We argue that the movement of manufacturing to inland China is not primarily about cheaper workers, but instead signals the beginning of a fundamental shift in the development model through the employment of a localized workforce. Having more workers from within the province, local governments in inland provinces will be more inclined to develop inclusive social policies and improve labor conditions. Local governments in coastal provinces that inherit fundamentally different demographic structures are less likely to pursue this governance style. We use audit data from Apple corporation suppliers (2007-2013), supplementary survey data, and in-depth interviews to discuss the relationship between localized production and better labor conditions. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last two decades public administration and public services have undergone profound changes with far-reaching impacts on employment relations and working conditions. The paper presents the perceptions and lived experiences of workers affected by liberalization and privatization of public services. In doing so it focuses on workers' ideas of fairness and dignity at work using the concepts of distribution, recognition and the public ethos of the common good and linking them to fundamental principles of justice. It is argued that the perception of inequalities as fair, while it is shaped by custom, is also being socially constructed during far-reaching changes. The analysis is based on a series of qualitative interviews conducted in Austria, Germany and Switzerland with postal-service workers, a sector well suited for the analysis because of the far-reaching changes in terms of market regulation, ownership of organizations, labour regulation, employment and working conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we investigate the evolution of occupational health and safety ( OHS) legislation aimed at harnessing workplace bullying. We begin with a brief discussion of workplace safety and literature covering workplace bullying. Then we present an overview of the development of Australian OHS legislation in recognising the influence of psychosocial hazards such as bullying. Following this we examine the Fair Work Commission's anti-bullying jurisdiction which commenced on 1 January 2014. We argue that while the new anti-bullying laws are a welcome response to the problem of workplace bullying, they offer a minimalist rather than a comprehensive remedy to the problem. We conclude that the only way to provide an adequate response is to create stand-alone legislation that recognises bullying as a criminal offence with remedies sufficiently castigatory to act as a deterrent to would-be workplace bullies and prompt proactive workplace cultural change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically explores the incidence of labor inspections across registered firms in 72 developing countries. Results show that larger firms are more likely to be inspected than smaller firms. Interestingly, inspections are less likely to occur among firms with a larger share of low-skilled workers, and that operate in industries with more tax evasion. We explore the heterogeneity of these findings across income and geographic groups, and conclude by briefly discussing the consistency of the stylized facts with competing theories of inspection agencies' behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines union grievances dealing with the body, appearance and demeanour fought by the Canadian Air Line Flight Attendants Association, on behalf of its female and male members over a 30-year period. Taking a historical, materialist-feminist approach, we examine how workers used the grievance system to resist regulations they believed contradicted their right to dignified labour. We ask how and why bodily regulation differed for men and women, and how this changed over time, as the union merged its male and female job occupations. Using arbitrated grievances, union records and discussion of these issues in the mass media, we show how both feminism and service union activism encouraged flight attendant resistance to airlines' efforts to regulate the appropriate body and attire for male and female workers. The use of labour law offered workers some respite from regulation, but did not facilitate fundamental questions about the power of management to 'dress' its workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When it was passed in 1938, the Fair Labor Standards Act ( FLSA) sought to address the 'evils' of underpay and overwork by establishing an hourly minimum wage and requiring premium overtime pay. However, today's low-wage, hourly workers more often face underwork than overwork, as well as fluctuating, unstable schedules, neither of which is addressed by the FLSA. This paper presents and assesses the effectiveness of an alternative approach to wage and hour regulation, the 'reporting pay' guarantee. We begin by examining the problem of work-hour insecurity, particularly employers' practice of sending workers home early from scheduled shifts. We then move to a detailed assessment of state laws that require reporting pay, as well as reporting pay guarantees in union contracts and private-employer practices that attempt to address the problem of work-hour insecurity. We conclude by considering paths for strengthening such protections in law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In her introductory paper, the coordinator of this Special Issue puts the selection of subsequent contributions into context. Traditional industrial relations institutions, born of labour law's premise of unbalanced power relations between the worker and the employer, are being undermined by unprecedented global changes in patterns of work and forms of employment. This trend, compounded by the emergence of alternative forms of worker representation, poses a major challenge not only to conventional tradeunionism but also to policy and to industrial relations scholarship. This Special Issue is intended as a contribution to the ensuing, ongoing debate about the direction of future change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing pervasiveness of web-based technologies presents employers with particular challenges in terms of employee voice and resistance, as well as surveillance, privacy and discipline. This paper is concerned with the implications for human resource management and labour law of the social media policies with which employers increasingly regulate employee online behaviour when off-duty. The object is to consider in particular the content of employers' social media policies in relation to expression of employee voice, and the limits which national labour laws might impose. Employment laws in Australia and the United States are compared. Through focusing on the implications of social media policies for the regulation of employees' online behaviour outside the workplace, this paper is concerned also with the purpose and scope of employment law and human resource policy, particularly in relation to employees' private lives and, by association, the scope of employees' implied contractual duties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous literature argues that labour employment protection influences corporate investment through three mechanisms. Using the Labour Contract Law (LCL) in China as an exogeneous shock, we analyse publicly listed companies with regression discontinuity design, and we find that production flexibility plays a mediating role among these mechanisms. On one hand, LCL increases the labour cost of labour‐intensive firms (LIFs); on the other hand, LCL increases capital spending of non‐labour‐intensive firms (NLIFs). These findings are not ascribed to industry differences, are not driven by the boom of the housing market or other contemporary shocks, and are robust to alternative measures and placebo tests. We conjecture that NLIFs can flexibly replace labour with physical capital. As for LIFs, labour and capital must be maintained at a fixed ratio and thus neither labour nor capital can be readily adjusted. Cross‐sectional analyses confirm our conjecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]