Equal pay by gender and by nationality: a comparative analysis of Switzerland's unequal equal pay policy regimes across time

What explains the adoption of two different policies on equal pay by gender (EPG) and by nationality (EPN) in Switzerland? And why is the liberal, litigation-based, equal pay policy regime set up by the Gender Equality Act of 1996 much less effective than the neocorporatist ‘accompanying measures' to the Bilateral European Union-Switzerland Agreement on Free Movement of Persons adopted in 1999 to ensure equal pay for workers of different national origins? The formation of two different policy regimes cannot be explained by different levels of political will. Equally, different ‘varieties of capitalism' cannot explain the setup of the two different equal pay policy regimes within the very same country. Instead, our qualitative comparative analysis across time suggests that the differences can be best explained by a particular constellation of attributes, namely the use of different policy frames—i.e. ‘anti-discrimination' in the EPG and ‘unfair competition' in the EPN case—and the different setting of interest politics epitomised by the opposite stances adopted by Switzerland's employer associations in the two case

Wohnstandortwahl der «Creative Class» in der Agglomeration Zürich

Richard Florida focuses on the selected determinants affecting the choice of residence by the creative class at the regional level. He defines these determinants with the concept “quality of place”. The question arises of whether this approach can be transferred to a subregional level. In the empirical research at the subregional level, variables are added to “quality of place” and the creative class is differentiated into sectors. In this article, Florida’s assessment is applied to the subregional level, as is usual for assessments used to explain the choice of residence location. This allows an investigation of which location factors have a deciding influence on the residence location choices of the creative class in the Zurich agglomeration and what differences, if any, can be found between the various branches. An empirical analysis of the data for the agglomeration of Zurich in 2000 supports the transferability of Florida’s approach to the subregional level. However, it is evident that the differentiation of the creative class and the addition of other determinants to “quality of place” are essential

Årstidsvariasjoner og materialtransport i de fem feltforskningsområdene, Birkenes, Storgama, Langtjern, Kårvatn og Jergul

Karakteristiske variasjoner i vannkvaliteten i feltforskningsområdene igjennom året er beregnet for hvert felt ut fra 3-8 års data. Variasjonsmønsteret kan danne grunnlag for vurdering av nye data. Prognoseberegninger anvendt på Storgama viser at selv med 75 % reduksjon i sulfatinnholdet i avrenningen vil sure episoder (pH større enn 4,7) kunne forekomme på grunn av årstidsvariasjonene i vannkvalitet, selv om den beregnede midlere årlige pH blir god (pH 5,3). Materialtransportberegninger viser balanse mellom tilførsler og avrenning av sulfat når flere års data legges til grunn for beregningene, med unntak av Jergul hvor sulfat synes å akkumuleres i felte

The building blocks of job insecurity: The impact of environmental and person-related variables on job insecurity perceptions

This study unites two perspectives concerning the determinants of job insecurity perceptions that exist in the literature and that resemble the classical nature–nurture debate. On the ‘nurture’ side, we investigated the company performance and type of contract, while we focused on negative affectivity and locus of control on the ‘nature’ side. In addition to demonstrating the known main effects of the respective predictors, we examined the proportional reduction in prediction error for both predictor types. Based on Lazarus’ stress model, we also hypothesized interactive effects between the environmental and person-related predictors. Multilevel analyses of 640 employees from 50 companies revealed that all four variables significantly and incrementally predicted job insecurity in the hypothesized direction. Interestingly, the person-related variables contributed more than twice as much to the reduction in prediction error in job insecurity perceptions when compared with the environmental variables. Among the hypothesized interaction effects, only locus of control significantly interacted with type of contract in predicting job insecurity perceptions (employees on a temporary contract experienced a steeper incline in job insecurity perceptions with increasing levels of external locus of control relative to employees on a permanent contract). We discuss implications for the conceptualization of job insecurity as well as practical implications

L’organisation de l’attribution de valeur : Sur l’importance des tierces parties pour la signalisation des qualités morales sur les marchés

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