Working Time and Work Organisation: Recent Trends in Working Time

The paper analyses the interrelation between working time and work organisation in Europe. This interrelation can be considered from the point of view of either employers or employees. For employers, it is becoming increasingly important today to adjust working time quickly to the order situation and to make intensive use of expensive plant and equipment. However, employees' working‐time preferences have also changed. A key factor in this respect is the increasing level of labour market participation among women, as well as growing interest in leave for further training or a phased entry into or exit from working life. The working‐time requirements of firms and those of employees do not necessarily coincide. To create sustainable working‐time structures, it is necessary to develop working‐time systems capable of reconciling the needs of firms and those of employees. A process of experimentation is currently under way in many firms in Europe. Some firms that rely on specialist knowledge and competencies are trying to increase working‐time flexibility in their core workforce while simultaneously considering their employees' interests. In other firms, however, particularly in labour‐intensive service industries dominated by price competition, Taylorism is still reinforced. Little account is taken of employees' interests. The process of “neo‐Taylorisation” is driven not by production but by the labour market. It is possible only because of the existence of wage differentiation and the availability in the labour market of a large pool of workers who can be deployed flexibly. This pool varies in size from country to country. It is all the larger the wider the wage dispersion, the lower the level of labour market regulation, the lower the share of skilled workers, the higher the unemployment rate, the higher the level of migration of unskilled workers into Europe and the lower the level of female integration into the labour market.