Market Detachment

While the dynamics of market attachments have been extensively analyzed, the implied other to this – market detachments – have not. This book addresses this imbalance and investigates economies of detachment or the processes whereby various elements or relations in markets are removed or severed. Market organizations and dynamics involve myriad processes of attachment – good and bad. Recent work within the new economic sociology has documented how the arts of attachment are implicated in the technical, organizational and social functions of markets. This work highlights the complexities of market attachments as both material links and subjective or affective ties. It also foregrounds attachment as a variable relation, often dependent on its implied other: detachment. However, while the first term of this relation is relatively well known, the second is seriously under-researched and deserves far more attention. Key questions explored are: what is detachment; how does it work and what are the theoretical underpinnings and implications of this concept? How do practices and strategies of detachment configure and ‘re-agence’ markets? How do markets provoke attitudes and dispositions of detachment? How do detachment strategies become qualified as political and with what consequences? The authors in this unique collection explore these questions using an array of empirical cases ranging from fast fashion to food supply chains, energy savings schemes to unpackaged food. Working across economic sociology, science and technology studies (STS), cultural studies, politics and consumer research they highlight the complexities, significance and impacts of ‘letting go’ in market configurations. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the journal, Consumption, Markets & Culture.

Portraits of Labor Market Exclusion presents "profiles" or "portraits" of individuals who have limited labor-market attachment. It is widely accepted that those with limited attachment to the labor market are a highly heterogeneous group (including, for instance, recent job losers, long-term unemployed, school leavers with no labor-market experience, those close to retirement age, or people with caring responsibilities), and that understanding their circumstances and potential barriers is an essential prerequisite for designing and implementing a tailored and effective mix of policy support and incentives. The report takes a comprehensive view, focusing on both the labor market attachment of a country's out-of-work population and the social assistance package and poverty profile of the same segment of the population. In essence, the report looks at individuals through the lenses of both poverty/welfare status and labor market indicators, and, in doing so, the portraits helps move the dialogue from a purely labor market-centric view to a broader dialogue that includes social policy as a whole. This is an important shift; for instance, social protection programs, such as family benefits and maternity benefits, and broader social policy issues such as retirement ages, often have a great impact on who remains inactive. Specifically, the report presents portraits of the out-of-work population of six countries (Bulgaria, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Lithuania and Romania) in terms of distance from the labor market, human capital, and labor supply conditions, as well as demographic conditions. The analysis relies on the European Union Statistics of Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) surveys for the years 2007 to 2011. Latent class analysis methodology allows multidimensional profiling of the out-of-work population, and identifies classes or groups of out-of-work individuals that are as homogeneous as possible within each class according to a set of observable characteristics, and as distant as possible between classes. Consequently, this analysis provide a much richer glimpse of the very different barriers to labor market integration that these various groups experience, considerably augmenting the limited amount of information contained in traditional descriptive statistics.

Too many workers leave the labour market permanently due to health problems or disability, and too few people with reduced work capacity manage to remain in employment. This is a social and economic tragedy common to virtually all OECD countries. It ...

Latvia’s public employment service, the State Employment Agency (SEA), is undertaking a modernisation of its service delivery. This review discusses the SEA’s digitalisation needs and strategy to guide its modernisation efforts. It provides a detailed assessment of the SEA’s digital infrastructure and key recommendations concerning its IT system, analytical capacity and digital tools for jobseekers and employers. This report on Latvia is the fourteenth country study published in this series.

The Office for Budget Responsibility was established to provide independent and authoritative analysis of the UK's public finances. Part of this role includes producing the official economic and fiscal forecasts. This report sets out forecasts for the period to 2016-17. The report also assesses whether the Government is on course to meet the medium-term fiscal objectives. The OBR assessment of the outlook and risks for the UK economy is broadly unchanged since the November 2011 report. A technical recession will be avoided with positive growth in the first quarter of 2012. GDP will grow by 0.8% in 2012, 2% in 2013, 2.7% in 2014 and 3% for 2015-16 period. Public sector net borrowing is forecast to total £126 billion, 8.3% of GDP this year which is £1.1 billion less than the November forecast. For 2016-17, the PSNB is then forecast to decline to £21 billion. The fall in PSNB in 2012-13 is much larger than the OBR's November forecast due to the Government's decision to transfer the Royal Mail's historic pension deficit. The Chancellor's decision to cut 50% additional rate income tax to 45% has an estimated direct cost to the Exchequer of £0.1 billion in 2013-14. Other forecasts by the OBR, include: the ILO unemployment rate to rise from 8.4% to 8.7% over the coming year; household disposable income growth to be weak in 2012-13, but consumption to begin to offer some support to the recovery in the second half of the year; that the situation in the euro area remains a major risk to accurate forecasting. The publication is divided into five chapters: Chapter 1: Executive summary; Chapter 2: Developments since the November 2011 forecast; Chapter 3: economic outlook; Chapter 4: Fiscal outlook; Chapter 5: Performance against the Government's fiscal targest; Annex A - Budget 2012 policy measures.

From the 1960s onwards, Japan’s rapid economic growth coincided with remarkably smooth transitions from school to work and with internationally low levels of youth unemployment. However, this changed dramatically in the 1990s, and by the 2000s, youth employment came to be recognized as a serious concern requiring an immediate response. What shape did this response take? Japan’s Emerging Youth Policy is the first book to investigate in detail how the state, experts, the media as well as youth workers have reacted to the troubling rise of youth joblessness in early 21st century Japan. The answer that emerges is as complex as it is fascinating, but comprises two essential elements. First, instead of institutional ‘carrots and sticks’ as seen in Europe, actors belonging to mainstream Japan have deployed controversial labels such as NEET (‘Not in Education, Employment or Training’) to steer inactive youth into low-wage jobs. A second approach has been crafted by entrepreneurial youth support leaders that builds on what the author refers to as ‘communities of recognition’. As illustrated in this book using evidence from real sites of youth support, one such methodology consists of ‘exploring the user’ (i.e. the support-receiver) whereby complex disadvantages, family relationships and local employment contexts are skilfully negotiated. It is this second dimension in Japan’s response to youth exclusion that suggests sustainable, internationally attractive solutions to the employment dilemmas that virtually all post-industrial nations currently face but which none have yet seriously addressed. Based on extensive fieldwork that draws on both sociological and policy science approaches, this book will be welcomed by students, scholars and practitioners in the fields of Japanese and East Asian studies, comparative social policy, youth sociology, the sociology of social problems and social work.

This 2015 Article IV Consultation highlights that Israel’s economy has been doing well and near-term growth prospects are favorable. Following growth of 2.6 percent in 2014, the economy is expected to expand by about 2.5 percent in 2015 and 3–3.3 percent each year in the medium term. Employment creation has been remarkable—growing by 3.5 percent annually—and unemployment is at multi-decade lows. Inflation has been negative, but this trend reflects temporary external factors, not domestic weakness. Debt has declined to 67 percent of GDP from a peak of 94 percent of GDP in 2003 but is expected to increase for the first time since 2009, following the upward revisions to the deficit targets.

Exacerbated by the Great Recession, youth transitions to employment and adulthood have become increasingly protracted, precarious, and differentiated by gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Youth Labor in Transition examines young people's integration into employment, alongside the decisions and consequences of migrating to find work and later returning home. The authors identify key policy challenges for the future related to NEETS, overeducation, self-employment, and ethnic differences in outcomes. This illustrates the need to encompass a wider understanding of youth employment and job insecurity by including an analysis of economic production and how it relates to social reproduction of labor if policy intervention is to be effective. The mapping and extensive analysis in this book are the result of a 3½-year, European Union-funded research project (Strategic Transitions for Youth Labour in Europe, or STYLE; http://www.style-research.eu) coordinated by Jacqueline O'Reilly. With an overall budget of just under 5 million euros and involving 25 research partners; an international advisory network and local advisory boards of employers, unions, and policymakers; and non-governmental organizations from more than 20 European countries, STYLE is one of the largest European Commission-funded research projects to exist on this topic. Consequently, this book will appeal to an array of audiences, including academic and policy researchers in sociology, political science, economics, management studies, and more particular labor market and social policy; policy communities; and bachelor's- and master's-level students in courses on European studies or any of the aforementioned subject areas.