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This paper analyses how the employment histories of cohorts born after World War II in Germany have changed. A specific focus is on the role of atypical employment in this context.

This paper uses data from the adult cohort of the National Educational Panel Study and presents descriptive evidence on employment patterns for different cohorts. In addition, a sequence analysis of employment trajectories illustrates key aspects related to the opportunities and risks of atypical employment.

Younger cohorts are characterised by acquiring more education, by entering into employment at a higher age and by experiencing atypical employment more often. The latter is associated with much higher employment of women for younger cohorts. The sequence analysis reveals that the proportion of individuals whose entry into the labour market is almost exclusively characterised by atypical employment rises significantly across the cohorts. Moreover, a substantial part of the increase in atypical employment is due to the increased participation of women, with part-time jobs or mini-jobs playing an important role in re-entering the labour market after career breaks.

The most important contribution of this article to the existing literature lies in the life course perspective taken for different birth cohorts. The findings are of great interest to the general debate about the success of the German labour market in recent decades and its implications for individual labour-market histories, but also about rising income inequality at about the same time.

The growth of non‐standard or atypical forms of employment, such as part‐time, casual work and so on, represents one of the most dramatic changes in the structure of employment in Australia and other countries since the late 1970s. Management employment strategies have been identified as a major causal factor in the expansion of non‐standard employment. Employers are increasingly using these atypical forms of employment as a means of lowering direct labour costs. Argues, however, that there are a number of hidden costs involved in using non‐standard employment that are not commonly taken into consideration. Highlights the negative effects atypical employment can have on work relations, and the motivation of employees, based on a detailed hospital case study and other evidence. Argues that atypical labour may serve to undermine quality standards and the attainment of business strategies.

The issue of non‐standard forms of employment has sparked controversy in Greece. At the same time the expansion of atypical employment has been identified by policy makers as a central component of economic policy in combating high unemployment. However, there is a marked absence of empirical studies on this issue. This study sheds light on contractual flexibility surveying thirty establishments. The survey used an employer questionnaire to assess the extent to which Greek employers have engaged in various forms of atypical employment as well as the driving forces and managerial perceptions of the pertinent institutional framework. Results reveal that temporary work is the primary source of contractual flexibility, and that this is mainly used to adjust corporate capacity to demand variations, not to cut labour costs. Managerial discontent with governmental legislation on working time flexibility has led employers to embrace the EU's flexibility‐security approach through collective bargaining.

The welfare state as suggested and recommended by the Beveridge Report of 1942 and as subsequently applied since the mid 1940s, is a far cry to the welfare state which exists today in Great Britain, for, as a result of economic pressures, the recession, various other factors, and particularly the political ideology of the present Tory government under Mrs. Margaret Thatcher and Mr. John Major which has been in power since 1979, it becomes clear that the golden age of the welfare state has lost much of its shine. Should the present government continue in office after the next general election, it could well be that the welfare state will dwindle into non‐significance. Indeed, there is currently a crisis in the British welfare state when compared with the ideals of Beveridge of freedom from want and providing people with their needs.

The purpose of this paper is to illuminate an example of current practices and processes that enable transformation in the workplace in a South African multi-unit hospitality and tourism business, affording previously disadvantaged people the opportunity to advance in the organization and participate in the management and ownership of that organization.

A constructivist grounded theory methodological framework is used for the collection of data, analysis and theoretical development, utilizing Charmaz’s (2006, 2011, 2014) approach in both the collection and analysis of data as well as the theoretical perspective that emerged from the research process. Intensive semi-structured recorded interviews were conducted with the owner and managers of the company. Following transcription of the interviews, multi-level data coding allowed the move from an inductive to an abductive process with theoretical sampling allowing the shift toward conceptual and theoretical development.

Study findings provide insight about the processes and practices that enabled previously disadvantaged people to move into management and ownership of a multi-unit South African hospitality and tourism business. Leapfrogging emerged as a theoretical perspective that provides interpretive understanding of atypical upward employment mobility, i.e. “human leapfrogging.”

While this study is limited to a single hospitality and tourism company in South Africa that is not necessarily typical of other South African businesses, it provides a vivid illustration of the impact that visionary leadership and a genuine desire to “level the playing field” can have on individuals, both personally and professionally, and their wider communities.

Leapfrogging theory in the context of “human leapfrogging” suggests innovative business practices for fast-tracking marginalized individuals out of poverty and provides an urgently needed theoretical perspective for this process.

To the authors’ knowledge, the leapfrogging concept has not previously been applied in the context of atypical employment progression within the corporation, nor has its impact on the corporation and the lives of the affected individuals and their communities been examined.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of the legal relationship tying workers to employers. It explores how the individual who is categorised as an employee is distinguished from a self-employed or independent contractor or a worker. The common law tests for classifying employment status are analysed against a backdrop of emerging research literature. Recommendations for reform are provided, drawing from the work of prominent scholars such as Mark Freedland and Simon Deakin.

The paper reviews court decisions and examines arguments raised in relation to the binary divide between employed and self-employed. The paper is largely conceptual.

This paper has shown that divergence between law and realities of employment still puzzle modern law reformers and judges alike. The common law test have proved to be inadequate and new solutions have been recommended. One of the suggest solutions is to import the doctrine of good faith into the tests.

The paper makes recommendations that will further refine and clarify the employment relationship in a bid to create a more inclusive “labour law” capable of protecting a wider range of atypical and vulnerable work relations. This paper will inform managers on the challenges in relation to classification of employment status brought about by the growth in atypical work.

Investigates the Polish Labour Code and how it has been updated to modern standards similar to those int he rest of Europe. States the Polish Labour code doctrine is for maintaining the multiplicity of employment contracts, defined by the Labour Code in corresponding to various needs and interests of both employers and employees. Sets out four main conclusions in depth, which cover labour relations contracts in full and how they are perceived to affect the workers and bosses.

Numerous management commentators have suggested that the 1980s have witnessed considerable change in employee relations at establishment level in Irish organizations. However, much of this analysis has been quite vague on the precise nature of such change. Employee relations management in Ireland has traditionally been associated with a strong collectivist, industrial relations emphasis. Attempts to evaluate the extent of change in management approaches to employee relations in the 1980s. In particular looks at issues such as developments in employment structure, flexibility and changing patterns of industrial conflict. Also considers the emergence of Human Resource Management (HRM) approaches in the Irish context.

Reviewing the persistence of high levels of unemployment in the EU, finds that this has been accompanied by an increasing incidence of low pay and the adoption of “atypical” employment contracts. The policy response, drawing on the experience of the US economy, has been to advocate the creation of flexible labour markets. It suggests that it is not possible to account for the deterioration in the European labour market in terms of an increase in the supply of labour. The fall in demand for labour is examined in terms of long‐run structural changes and in particular it draws attention to the impact of increased import penetration. Finally it discusses the consequences for public funding of welfare, investment in education and training, and the emergence of a permanent labour surplus economy.

In recent years, there has been a concern that employers are falsely classifying employees as self-employed to evade collective agreements and labour laws (e.g. minimum wages, working time legislation and protection in case of redundancy), and the result is that these dependent self-employed suffer poorer working conditions. The purpose of this paper is to provide an extensive evaluation of the working conditions of those in dependent self-employment compared with the genuine self-employed.

To do so, data are reported from a 2015 European Working Conditions Survey of 35,765 workers in 28 European Union member states.

Of the 4.3 per cent of the working population found to be in dependent self-employment, the finding is that they have similar working conditions to the genuine self-employed in terms of their physical and social environment and intensity of work. However, they have poorer job prospects and less ability to use their skills and discretion than the genuine self-employed. In terms of the working time quality, meanwhile, the finding is that they have better conditions than the genuine self-employed. Therefore, this analysis uncovers the need for a more nuanced understanding of the relative working conditions of the dependent self-employed.

If the working conditions of the dependent self-employed are to be tackled, evaluation is now required of whether the current policy approaches, such as developing a hybrid category of employment with legal rights attached, address the specific working conditions that are worse for the dependent self-employed.

This is one of the few papers which provides an extensive evaluation of the working conditions of those in dependent self-employment in the EU28.