Introduction The Present Oppression of Labour: Causes and Consequences

Cosimo Perrotta, Salvatore Rizzello and Claudia Sunna
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Salvatore Rizzello: University of Salento

Chapter Chapter 1 in Human Capital, 2023, pp 1-12 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The welfare state reversed the traditional accumulation based on the squeeze of wages to increase profits. It relied on human capital growth and productivity rise. However, the latter implied that the new public investments were based on collective goods and the growth of human capital. The lack of this kind of growth created saturation and unemployment. Then the big companies used unemployment in order to squeeze wages again and to attack the state and public interest. This means that the unequal distribution of incomes did not provide a parallel growth in productivity due to the check of costs through low wage policy. Such a policy hinders the expansion of skilled labour and increases inequalities while creating a vicious downward circle. All this has hindered the natural selection of skill in the division of labour, made the latter not work properly and introduced growing mismatches in the “codified knowledge” which grants the normal increase in productivity. Consequently in routines, the negative factors linked to repetition increased, while making labour dull and little productive. So routines could not any more drive the creative increase in productivity. Such deadlocks can be overcome only through an economy policy in which governments directly promote new investments in new fields, so that employment increases. This in turn will hinder productivity based on low wages and precarious labour, will stop consumption being repetitive and will make the level of utility increase again. New investments must cover the new needs and provide new types of consumption such as skilled education, better public health, more public transport, a non-polluted environment and the substitution of fossil fuels with green energy sources.

Keywords: Welfare state; Public investments; Skilled labour; Codified knowledge; Public investments (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-34494-7_1

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