PSI blog on the Financial Crisis

A skilled approach to economic recovery

The economic crisis has destabilised working conditions for workers around the world. Young and older workers are particularly affected.

Along with throwing millions of people out of work, the crisis is accelerating the shift from secure employment towards temporary and contract work.

A long period of unemployment can cripple someone’s future employability. That’s why we need everybody to take action to address the issue of skills training. This requires joint participation of governments, trade unions, private employers, public institutions, schools and training providers. Coordinated commitment is particularly important to ensure a just transition to sustainable ‘green’ jobs.

I recently attended a Global Dialogue forum hosted by the International Labour Organisation, which looked at ways to address current and future skills across different job sectors. The ILO has been asked to prepare a training strategy for consideration at the upcoming G20 ministerial meeting in Washington, DC.

Forum participants agreed that developing countries need the support of other countries and social partners to address training challenges. And, that governments and private employers must contribute adequate investment to training plans. Participants also called on G20 labour and employment ministers to advocate for sectoral approaches in training. Further, training initiatives must consider the needs of local and regional labour markets.

Ensuring people are equipped with the new skills necessary to address changing labour market requirements is crucial for economic recovery. Investing in public services skills training should be a priority in this effort.

Peter Waldorff, PSI General Secretary

Jobs Crisis Will Affect Young Workers for a Lifetime, More Recovery Aid Needed

Speaking at the second and final day of the Demos conference, A Better Deal 2009, Algernon Austin, an analyst at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), said the U.S. economy was failing young people long before the current recession was officially declared. He called the prospects for young workers “bleak” and said the nation needs additional investment in recovery.

The recession is hitting young people in devastating and long-lasting ways (as we found in the AFL-CIO “Young Workers: A Lost Decade” report), and solving these problems will require an immediate focus on job creation, as well as long-term investments to build a strong economy through education, training and infrastructure, panelists at “On the Rebound” agreed. Although the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act prevented a more severe depression, the jobs crisis requires more direct action.

More here: http://blog.aflcio.org/2009/10/16/jobs-crisis-will-affect-young-workers-for-a-lifetime-more-recovery-aid-needed/#more-20768

The Global Economic and Financial Crisis and its impact on youth

Young people, migrant and women workers are the most vulnerable to the current downturn and are all faced with considerable difficulties in integrating in today’s labour market. This trend stands to be exacerbated by the global crisis and if viable solutions are not found, personal development and future employment prospects are threatened for millions of young people.

Compared to adults, youth are almost three times as likely to be unemployed, and although they make up only 24.7 percent of the total working-age population, youth make up as much as 40.2 percent of the world’s total unemployed. In fact, between 1997 and 2007, the number of unemployed youth rose from 63 million to 71 million, an increase of 13.6 percent according to the ILO. The global number of unemployed in 2008 is estimated at 190 million, out of which 109 million are men and 81 million are women and the global unemployment rate increased from 5.7 per cent in 2007 to 6.0 per cent in 2008.

Full text here: http://youth.ituc-csi.org/-youth-community-blog-

Young people, the financial crisis and trade unions

By Indah Budiarti, Organising and Communication Coordinator, PSI regional office for Asia/Pacific

The current global economic crisis has hit people the world over, resulting in massive lay-offs and causing increasing unemployment. The ILO has predicted that global unemployment could increase to 239 million people this year with an estimated 100 million in Asia. Young people are the most affected and are 2.8 times more likely to be unemployed than adults.

Child labour is also on the rise as an increasing number of children, in particular girls, risk dropping out of school as parents tend to prefer providing an education to boys. Young women in particular, face a double challenge: being female and being young. In some communities, cultural norms often define them as “second class citizens” assigning them to a caring and reproductive role instead of being able to access an education.

The majority of young people are in underpaid, vulnerable jobs. Many are migrating in the hope of finding better paying jobs overseas
• In Indonesia, with over 38.4 million young women and men between 15 and 24 years old, young people are five times more likely to be unemployed than their adult counterparts.
• In Timor Leste, around 48% of the population is aged between 15 and 29 years (2004, population Census). This is due to the political turmoil and violence which have led to increasing poverty and illiteracy and a huge informal sector which accounts for over 80 per cent of the working population.
• In Japan, many young workers suffer from Karōshi or, literally translated, death from overwork, due to a 65 to 70 hour working week.

The growing trend for casual, part-time or contract workers means that many young people enter the labour market with little or no social security coverage, low wages, precarious employment contracts, and in many cases, occupational hazards. Many young workers have little or no knowledge of their rights and therefore lack the ability to defend themselves.

However, attracting young workers into the labour and trade union movement is not easy. Trade unions are often perceived by them in a negative light: too old-fashioned and bureaucratic, focused only on the traditional struggle for wages and working conditions.

What can unions do to encourage young workers to join and be active in the trade union movement? Young workers still believe in unions as an agent for change, but unions must change the way they manage and organise themselves in the current situation and for the future. Young workers want unions to go beyond their traditional roles, they want modern, strong, vibrant public sector unions that can play a role and have an influence in the political and economic spheres.

Workers who join a union earn more money, have better benefits and have a voice at work. Why don’t you join a union? If you are already in a union, be active and participate!

Here are some useful examples of videos and campaigns aimed particularly, but not exclusively, at young people:

Do you know what a Trade Union Is? An interesting video by Team Video Productions which polls young people and students in the street on their views of trade unions in the workplace: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8CNZLQKwcU

Most Powerful When We Stand Together. Grocery workers in Bethesda, Maryland talk about how standing together gives them more bargaining http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0vXcqckjwA&feature=related.

You deserve better: join a union. This video summarises in one minute why it’s important to be a member of a union. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnYDzJkXXVM

Just another cog in the machine. This video by the TUC, UK, gives an important message in a clever and effective way. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLGoKqPAhSk
 
Jobber du naked? (Go to work naked?) http://old.fagforbundet.no/jobberdunaken/ A campaign aimed specifically at young people informing them of their rights at the workplace and why it is good for them to join a union. Norwegian union Fagforbundet’s youth section has set up this awareness campaign to promote workers’ rights and to encourage young workers to join the union.

Recession robs Spain's youth of jobs and hope

The ongoing economic crisis has pummelled Spain. Small businesses feel abandoned by the government, layoffs are swelling the ranks of the desperate, and a whole generation of recent college graduates is facing a future without prospects.

It was early July when it finally happened and nothing came out of the ATM. With a sinking feeling, Iñigo Ortega went into his usual bank to print out his statements. The bank's maintenance fee had been debited from his account, and there was nothing left -- his savings were gone. It had taken only three months to go completely broke.

As recently as March, Ortega, 36, was employed as the head of a small but upscale architectural firm on La Castellana, Madrid's grand boulevard, making €3,000 ($4,280) a month. But the firm specialized in luxury restorations and renovating hotels in historic buildings, and it had been getting fewer and fewer lucrative contracts. It wasn't really a surprise, seeing that the worsening economic crisis was keeping millions of foreign tourists away. The most creative designer on the firm's six-person team was the last one to be let go. And it was Ortega's bad luck that he had been working for the last four years as a freelancer without a set contract that would have entitled him to claim unemployment benefits.

"My job's gone, my money's gone and so is my hope," Ortega says bitterly as he leafs nervously through his documents.

Full text from Spiegel Online International, click here:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,638981,00.html