Income inequality in the digital era. WP C.S.D.L.E. "Massimo D'Antona", N. 9, 2002

[From the Introduction]. The changes in the employment relationship have been accompanied by a marked deterioration in income distribution.... The growing gap between rich and poor stands as a persistent reminder that current economic arrangements are not moving in the direction of economic justice. The dramatic extent of inequality offends our sense of decency and undermines social cohesion. In recent years, many economists have analyzed the trends in income distribution in order to isolate the causes of the current trends. In this paper I review the existing evidence and theories about the causes of rising income inequality. I suggest that the changing nature of the employment relationship is contributing to, or perhaps even driving, rising income inequality. The following chapter presents and evaluates several policy proposals for redressing inequality or ameliorating its effects

Flexibilization, Globalization, and Privatization: Three Challenges to Labour Rights in Our Time

Three dynamics are coalescing to reshape labour relations in the twenty-first century in the United States: They are flexibilization, globalization, and privatization. Flexibilization refers to the changing work practices by which firms no longer use internal labour markets or implicitly promise employees lifetime job security, but rather seek flexible employment relations that permit them to increase or diminish their workforce, and reassign and redeploy employees with ease. Globalization refers to the increase in cross-border transactions in the production and marketing of goods and services that facilitates firm relocation to low labour cost countries. And privatization refers to the rise of neo-liberal ideology, the attack on big government and the dismantling of the social safety net that have dominated public policy in the United States in recent years. All three of these dynamics have been detrimental to U.S. employment standards and union strength. This article describes how each of these dynamics has undermined labour rights and then asks, what prospects are there, in light of this environment, for protecting employment rights, re-invigorating unions, and securing a social safety net? The author answers by pointing to the many areas of social life in which the spread of the global leads to the reemergence. of the local. She argues that the response to the global threat to labour standards lies in a revival of collective action at the local level. She further contends that the combined forces of flexibilization, globalization, and privatization make collective action at the local level not only necessary, but also possible

Das Amerikanische Arbeitsrecht aus der Perspektive Historischer und Zukünftiger Entwicklungen

In den vergangenen 15 Jahren ließen sich im amerikanischen Kollektiv- und Individualarbeitsrecht sowohl eine Fortsetzung der früheren Trends als auch die Entstehung neuer Themenfelder beobachten.Das System des kollektiven Arbeitsrechts, das die gewerkschaftliche Interessenvertretung und die Beziehungen zwischen den Beschäftigten und dem Management regelt, hat sich in seiner grundlegenden, auf die Zeit der Great Depression und die Jahre unmittelbar nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg zurückgehenden Rechtsstruktur kaum verändert. Das amerikanische Individualarbeitsrecht hat dagegen mit der Einführung zusätzlicher individueller Arbeitnehmerrechte eine beträchtliche Dynamik entwickelt. Die Veränderungen in der Arbeitsorganisation und die Entwicklung neuer Formen von Arbeitsverträgen bedeuten eine zusätzliche Herausforderung für die traditionelle Sicht der Arbeitsbeziehungen, auf denen ein beträchtlicher Teil des amerikanischen Arbeitsrechts basiert. Schließlich wurden auch durch den Globalisierungsprozess und den Beitritt der Vereinigten Staaten zu neuen Handelsabkommen neue arbeitsrechtliche Fragen aufgeworfen.Durch diese Entwicklungen ergeben sich große Probleme für die derzeitige, im amerikanischen Arbeitsrecht verankerte, Struktur der kollektiven Interessenvertretung

The Business Case for Community Paramedicine: Lessons from Commonwealth Care Alliance's Pilot Program

Mobile integrated health care and community paramedicine (MIH-CP) programs expand the role of traditional emergency medical services personnel to address non-emergency needs and bring outpatient primary and urgent care into patients' homes. These programs offer potential for reducing health care costs, eliminating unecessary emergency department use, and shifting service back to community-based and home settings. Between 2014 and 2015, the Massachusetts-based Commonwealth Care Alliance (CCA) piloted a community paramedicine prgoram, Acute Community Care (ACC), to serve its members in the Greater Boston area.This brief summarizes ACC's business case assessment, which showed that increasing patient volume after the pilot period would reuslt in net savings given the progam's success in averting unnecessary emergency care. By illustrating cost considerations for an expansion of MIH-CP services, this brief may inform the design and sustainability planning of other MIH-CP programs. The business case assessment was conducted by Mathematica Policy Research through support from the Center for Health Care Strategies' Complex Care Innovation Lab, a Kaiser Permanente Community Benefit-funded initiative

Positrons in Cosmic Rays from Dark Matter Annihilations for Uplifted Higgs Regions in MSSM

We point out that there are regions in the MSSM parameter space which successfully provide a dark matter (DM) annihilation explanation for observed positron excess (e.g. PAMELA), while still remaining in agreement with all other data sets. Such regions (e.g. the uplifted Higgs region) can realize an enhanced neutralino DM annihilation dominantly into leptons via a Breit-Wigner resonance through the CP-odd Higgs channel. Such regions can give the proper thermal relic DM abundance, and the DM annihilation products are compatible with current antiproton and gamma ray observations. This scenario can succeed without introducing any additional degrees of freedom beyond those already in the MSSM.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figure