Labour Market in the United Kingdom Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Labour Market in the United Kingdom - Essay Example The employment pattern in Britain is however different today. With over 70 per cent of the population in United Kingdom classified as being in work, there has been a notable trend of movement towards part-time employment from full-time employment (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998). Worth noting is the fact that the number of women in employment in steadily increasing. For instance, women accounted for just over half all part-time employment in 1998 (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998). Moreover, it was estimated that in the same year 45 per cent of women in United Kingdom were in part time employment as compared to 8 per cent of men. Additionally, the flexibility of the labour market in United Kingdom allows people to have more than one job. For example, nearly 1.3 million people had two or more jobs by 1998 (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998) Although changes in the labour market in the United Kingdom have been towards a more open and non-discriminatory system, there has been criticism that the market employs a "voluntaristic" tradition (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998). However, some economists view the labour market as a form of free market. In such a setting, there is freedom for employers to implement meaningful utilization of labour while avoiding impracticable and induced level of labour costs (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998). Furthermore, the free labour market attracts inward investment in United Kingdom (Mabey, Salaman, & Storey 1998). In contradistinction, it is noteworthy that a very flexible labour market may compromise work relations or undermine worker output. As Mabey, Salaman, and Storey (1998) noted, employers in the free about market may seek low-cost strategies to access labour. Such a move would result in underinvestement in training, poor skills at work, low pay for the workers and fierce competition at the lower level of the labour market [Streeck 1992, cited in Mabey, Salaman, and Storey (1998)]. From the aforementioned perspectives, it is worth noting that the effects of transformation in the labour market in United Kingdom in the past decade are amenable to discussion. While some changes have brought plausible benefits, some have caused compromise in the workplace employee relations (Blyton & Turnbull 2004). As noted above, a flexible labour market encourages employer-independence in making decisions. Nevertheless, since the market is subject to competition, employers may use strategies such as pay adjustments to win employees. As such, employers may pay their employees based on performance (Blyton & Turnbull 2004). Effects of flexible labour market Although the free labour market allows employers freedom to employ without constraint, employers have to comply with the minimum wage directive that was introduced in 1997 (Howell 2005). Moreover, the flexibility in the labour market has caused a significant drop in the number of members joining trade unions. For example, while 49 over cent of the workforce in the United Kingdom were registered with labour unions, the figure dropped to 26.8 per cent in 2000 (Howell 2005). This may imply that employees enjoy better work relations currently than in 1980 hence the decline in