Online Talent Platforms, Labour Market Intermediaries and the Changing World of Work. Independent study prepared by CEPS and IZA for the World Employment Confederation-Europe and UNI Europa May 2018

By comparing the online talent platform economy and the temporary agency work sector, this study aims to contribute to a rapidly growing literature on new forms of work and their impact on the labour market. It shows that online talent platforms and temporary work agencies do have features in common, but there are also significant differences between the two, which make it difficult to use temporary agency work as a model for the online talent platform economy; in many cases, it would not be a good fit. That being said, the call by policy-makers, social partners and other stakeholders for a level playing field should not be overlooked. Furthermore, the study also confirms that any comparison of the online talent platform economy and the temporary agency work sector is hampered by a lack of data. In order to address this issue, continued monitoring and much more transparency of online talent platforms will be needed, as well as further data collection and analysis of both the online talent platforms and the temporary work agencies. These efforts are important because more flexible forms of work are likely to become increasingly prevalent in the future

Mesures d'atténuation à l'intérieur et à la sortie d'un silencieux passif équipé de baffles parallèles absorbants

peer reviewedThe mock-up of a great passive silencer used for noise attenuation in industrial applications has been designed and tested in laboratory. This mock-up consists of three metal casing containing the noise source and several removable rails and supports, allowing the test of different configurations of parallel absorbing baffles. The output of the silencer radiates in an anechoic chamber in order to simulate free-field conditions. The acoustic attenuation has been measured not only at the output, but also inside the silencer, with a mobile microphone located at several positions along the axis. Also, the tested configurations include three types of absorbing pillows and several geometrical arrangements. The results show that the maximum insertion loss (dB) measured at the output of the silencer corresponds to frequencies between 800Hz and 2.5kHz and its value strongly depends on the air gaps between baffles. The measurements with the mobile microphone show a linear decrease of the sound pressure level with the distance along the axis (mainly between 100Hz and 1kHz), which corresponds to the depth of absorbing material involved in the attenuation. Finally, a comparison with a real-scale silencer shows a fairly good correspondence.SW Gree