State Strategy for Developing Base Industries: A Massachusetts Case Study

In developing strategies for economic development, state governments must target base industries that bring income into the state and drive the rest of the economy. This article presents a case study of industry analysis and development strategy for Massachusetts, focusing on the state\u27s base industries. Particular attention is paid to the role of industry clusters — groups of industries linked through customer, supplier, or other relationships, and typically concentrated geographically as well. After assessing strengths and weaknesses of the state\u27s economy, the author concludes that despite the current severe recession, the state possesses the basis for renewed growth. Policy implications for the state government are summarized

Too many cooks?: changing wages and job ladders in the food industry

Consolidation and outsourcing in the food industry have created higher-paying food prep jobs, but also have erected barriers for lower-skilled workers trying to move up the ladder.Food industry and trade

The Gloves-off Economy: Workplace Standards at the Bottom of America\u27s Labor Market

[Excerpt] The goal of this volume is to map the landscape of gloves-off workplace strategies, to connect them to the erosion of norms farther up in the labor market, to identify the workers most vulnerable to these practices, and finally and perhaps most importantly, to identify the ways that the floor under job standards can be rebuilt. In what follows, we first explore conceptual tools for analyzing evasions and breaches of workplace standards and then briefly review evidence about the scope of the problem. We next trace the historical trajectory that first led to the upgrading of workplace protections, then to the partial undoing of the protective web of laws and standards—using this narrative as well to introduce the contents of the volume. We close by considering strategies to put the gloves back on in order to re-regulate work

"So Far From God, so Close to the United States", and yet…: Unexpected Differences in Modern Retail Jobs Between Mexico and the United States

La grande distribution moderne a créé une quantité importante d’emplois de premier échelon, dont beaucoup sont à bas salaire, au Mexique comme aux États-Unis d’Amérique.  Les structures et pratiques d’emploi du secteur composent des données importantes des processus qui créent et reproduisent les inégalités dans une économie. Grace à une étude internationale comparative, l’article explore le rôle des institutions et normes sociétales (liées et non-liées au travail) dans le domaine de la qualité des emplois. L’article compare les processus qui forment les emplois dans la grande distribution moderne de ces deux pays et s’appuie sur des études de terrain conduites durant les neuf dernières années. Les points de comparaison sont les trois dimensions de la qualité d’emploi : les heures de travail; les structures de rémunération; et la mobilité interne et externe. L’article montre que les institutions ont une empreinte visible sur les caractéristiques d’emploi dans la grande distribution. Les instances les plus simples consistent de cas où les institutions jouent directement sur l’emploi comme peut se voir avec les heures de travail. Cependant, les effets institutionnels indirects importent aussi, particulièrement ceux qui concernent les institutions de reproduction de la force de travail, telles que les systèmes de garde d’enfant ou les normes liées au rôle maternel dans l’éducation des enfants. Néanmoins, il reste encore une marge de manœuvre ample pour les choix et l’expérimentation de la part des managers de la grande distribution des deux pays.Modern retail chains generate large quantities of entry-level jobs, many of which are low-wage, in Mexico as in the United States. The sector’s employment patterns and practices make up an important strand among processes that generate and reproduce economy-wide inequality. Retail trade jobs also are emblematic of service work as a whole. With a cross-national comparative study, the paper explores the role of work-related and non-work related societal institutions and norms in affecting retail job quality. The paper compares the processes that shape modern retail jobs in the two countries relying upon sectorial field work conducted over the past nine years. Three dimensions of job quality are points of comparison: hours of work; compensation structure; and job mobility. The paper finds that national institutions have discernible imprints on the characteristics of retail jobs. The simplest instances are cases where institutions act directly on employment as occurs with hours of work outcomes. But indirect institutional effects are also important, particularly involving reproductive institutions such as child care systems and norms regarding mothers’ role in child rearing.  Still, ample room for managerial discretion and experimentation is found in both countries’ retail sectors

America’s Biggest Low-wage Industry: Continuity and Change in Retail Jobs

For those concerned with job quality in the United States, the retail industry commands attention. Retail is not only the largest low-wage industry in the country’s economy; it is the largest industry, period. It generates numerous entry level jobs for those with limited formal training. Hourly wages of nonsupervisory workers in retail languish at about three-quarters the national average. Retail is a very important employer of young workers. Its workforce is also disproportionately female. Women are concentrated in particular retail sub-sectors and some minority groups seem to remain employed in retail over time. At the same time, retail jobs—at least, those involving direct interaction with consumers—are geographically anchored, offering a potential leverage point for policies to improve job quality. We place retailers’ business strategies at the center of our analysis and trace the connections between corporate strategy and job quality. We focus on three main dimensions of job quality: compensation; schedule and its impact on the work-life nexus; and hiring and promotion opportunities. We examine the composition of the workforce in retail jobs and the likely implications of changes in job quality for the workforce. We use descriptive statistics from the Current Population Survey and draw on a unique set of retail case studies of food and consumer electronics retailers we conducted during 2005-07. We focus on frontline jobs: cashiers, clerks, and baggers positions

Short Hours, Long Hours: Hour Levels and Trends in the Retail Industry in the United States, Canada, and Mexico

In settings where most workers have full-time schedules, hourly wages are appropriate primary indicators of job quality and worker outcomes. However, in sectors where full-time schedules do not dominate—primarily service-producing activities—total hours matter, in addition to hourly wages, for job quality and worker outcomes. In this paper we employ a sector-focused, comparative framework to further examine hours levels—measured as average weekly hours—and trends in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. We analyze the retail sector, which is of interest because of its high rate of part-time employment in the U.S. Based on our fieldwork in the United States and Mexico and qualitative literature on Canadian retail work, we argue that the combination of business strategies and very different institutional constraints will lead U.S. retailers to a greater extent and Canadian retailers to a lesser extent to shorten hours and expand part-time jobs, whereas in Mexico it will lead retailers to lengthen hours. We apply this argument to predictions about differences in levels and trends. Drawing on standard public data sources from the three countries, we compare means and run time series regressions to estimate trends net of cyclical effects. Results broadly support our predictions, especially the distinction between the United States and Canada on the one hand and Mexico on the other. We provide additional context for these findings

Work-Based Social Support in the United States: Limits and New Possibilities

The U.S. social policy framework has always relied on private employers to fill in the gaps for workers, rather than the state. U.S. workers have neither a strong social safety net outside of the labor market, nor an extensive social welfare structure supporting the labor market. For the most part, adequate provision of social benefits depends critically on employers’ voluntary adoption of support policies. For example, the U.S. has neither a universal health plan nor a requirement that employers provide health insurance coverage; the U.S. public system of old-age pensions is work-based, and that public system falls short unless supplemented by additional (voluntary) employer contributions. This system largely marginalizes low earners, people of color and immigrant populations, and those unable to work or irregularly attached to the labor market, but also leaves much of the middle class vulnerable to cut-backs by their employers. This model is failing. Over the past generation, employers have increasingly pushed the burden of economic risks associated with illness, unemployment, or old age onto individuals and the state has not stepped in to cover those risks, exacerbating social exclusion. This trend has been offset by only a handful of countervailing factors, which been insufficient to change the overall course. While employers have maintained generous benefit packages for a privileged few, they have reduced employment benefits for most. Because of the centrality of employer-provided benefits and the absence or limited presence of broader government provision, this has significantly weakened economic security for most. This paper will start by discussing at some length the U.S. system of work-based social supports, how it has changed, and the consequences for workers. In the following section we briefly analyze the political and economic forces that have driven these changes, as well as counterforces that can help to build a better system of supports. We close with brief reflections on promising policy directions