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The criterion differentiating “protective labor legislation” and “industrial relations legislation” is not whether they are for or against the interest of labor. The interest is that of the general public, as is the case with all legislation. The basic difference concerns the parties to two types of labor contracts. Protective labor legislation concerns the individual contract and labor relations legislation concerns the contract between the specific groups in the field.

The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

The campaign for striker replacement legislation, which began in the late 1980s and had effectively ended by the mid-1990s, was the most important political battle over labor legislation since the defeat of the Labor Law Reform Bill in 1978. Striker replacement was the AFL-CIO’s top legislative priority in the early 1990s and, coming quickly after the passage of NAFTA, which labor had opposed, the defeat of its campaign solidified organized labor’s reputation for failure in legislative battles. As yet, however, the political campaign for striker replacement legislation has attracted surprisingly little attention from industrial relations scholars.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the differences in the effects of gender equality legislation on employment outcomes among female and male workers in industries with different intensity of foreign investment (namely, foreign direct investment (FDI)-intensive industries and non–FDI–intensive industries). The specific employment outcomes that were studied to compare the effects of the legislation are the working hours, employment opportunities, and wages of female and male workers in Taiwan.

Using data from the annual Manpower Utilization Survey, the authors applied a differences-in-differences-in-differences estimation method to test the effect of gender equality legislation on employment outcomes. By using multinomial logit, the authors measured the effect of the legislation on employment opportunities. To correct for simultaneity and selectivity problems/biases, the authors adopted Heckman two-stage selection procedures. Likewise, the authors used weighted least squares to solve heteroskedasticity in the wage and working hour equations. Further, the instrumental variable (IV) method was used to correct for simultaneity bias in the equation on working hour. The authors applied three stages estimation method following Killingsworth’s (1983) approach to measure the effect of the legislation on wages and working hours.

The authors found the restrictions enforced by the gender equality legislation (namely the Gender Equal Employment Act (GEEA), enacted in 2002) in Taiwan to have made certain impact on the workers’ working conditions in FDI-intensive industries. The major finding indicated that in a country like Taiwan, where the legislature tried tilling the perpetual gender gap in its labour market, by passing a law to counter inequality, could finally narrow the gender gap in wages among workers in the FDI-intensive industries. Although initially after the enactment of the GEEA (between 2002 and 2004), the gender gap in part-timers’ wages has widened, yet over a period of time the gap in their wages too has narrowed down, particularly during 2005-2006. The legislation, however, could not improve the job opportunities for full-time female workers’ in FDI-intensive industries. Besides, post 2002, the female workers were found to have worked for shorter hours than male workers, which according to us, could be largely attributed to the enforcement of the GEEA.

An in-depth analysis of the labour market effects of gender equality legislation should be useful to policymakers, especially those interested in understanding the impact of legislative measures and policy reforms on labour market and employment outcomes across industry types. If enforcement of a gender equality legislation has succeeded in reducing the gender gap more in one set of industries than the others (e.g. foreign owned instead of domestic industries), as the authors noticed in this study, then the same should have a bearing on revamping of future enactment and enforcement too.

Current study findings would not only provide the broad lessons to the policymakers in Taiwan, but the results that have emerged from a country case study could be referred by other growing economies who are enthusiastic about improving female workers’ working conditions through legislative reforms.

This book is a policy proposal aimed at the democratic left. It is concerned with gradual but radical reform of the socio‐economic system. An integrated policy of industrial and economic democracy, which centres around the establishment of a new sector of employee‐controlled enterprises, is presented. The proposal would retain the mix‐ed economy, but transform it into a much better “mixture”, with increased employee‐power in all sectors. While there is much of enduring value in our liberal western way of life, gross inequalities of wealth and power persist in our society.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to show that the effects of industry regulation on worker earnings are reconsidered using a wider array of industries and differentiating between industry‐opposed and industry‐supported legislation. Design/methodology/approach – Primary data from the Current Population Surveys are used in this paper with data on regulatory legislation from Cahan and Kaempfer. A difference‐in‐difference approach is used to compare wage changes pre‐ and post‐legislation, in industries with opposed or supported legislation, with those unaffected by legislation. The relative contribution of union and non‐union wage changes to the overall wage changes are also examined. Findings – The paper finds that regulatory legislation opposed by the industry did not affect earnings growth relative to industries not subject to regulatory legislation. Legislation supported by the industry led to slower relative earnings growth. Union wage differentials increased in industries with legislation regardless of industry opposition or support. Relative earnings declined among non‐union workers in industries that received legislation. The effects vary across industries with the results suggesting that some legislation led to increased product competition, while some legislation affected labor market competition. Research limitations/implications – The paper shows that data on regulatory legislation are limited by the lack of detailed information. For example, it is only known whether legislation was passed that was opposed or supported by the industry. Future research should replicate this analysis with more complete data. Practical implications – Also the paper sees that regulatory legislation does not need to completely regulate or deregulate an industry to affect workers. As such, policy makers should consider the effects of proposed legislation on workers in the affected industries. Originality/value – This paper directly tests whether the wage effects from regulation differ depending on industry opposition or support for the legislation. As such, this paper is innovative because it differentiates between different types of legislation in examining the effect of legislation on wages and the union differentials.

Nearly every country has committed to protect children from work that could be harmful or interfere with their education by ratifying the International Labour Organization Minimum Age Convention (C138). Yet there is little transparency and accountability around whether countries have followed through on these commitments by passing legislation to protect children from work. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This paper reports on analyses conducted of child labor legislation from all 193 United Nations member states to determine whether countries that have committed to ending child labor have taken the first step by passing legislation to protect children and youth from: work that is likely to be hazardous, work that is likely to interfere with their education and work that is harmful to their healthy development.

Findings show one in five ratifiers legally allow children to do hazardous work, and a similar number permit admission to employment at a young age. Moreover, legislative loopholes significantly undermine the protections that do exist in many countries.

Existing reporting mechanisms sometimes obscure whether central legal protections are in place, make cross-country comparisons difficult and impede the analysis of possible relationships between policies and outcomes across countries. This paper illustrates a novel approach to provide transparency and accountability on whether countries are meeting child labor commitments by using quantitative, globally comparable policy indicators.

In the US minimum wages were initially enacted by individual states, beginning with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1912. These laws were modeled on legislation enacted over the previous two decades in Australia, New Zealand, and England (Fisher, 1926, chap. 8; Hammond, 1915, 1913; Hobson, 1915; Hart, 1994, chaps. 2 & 3; Morris, 1986). From 1912 to 1923, the legislatures of 16 states, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia passed minimum wage legislation, although not all of them were operational by the end of this period (Brandeis, 1935, p. 501; Clark, 1921; Millis & Montgomery, 1938, chap. 6; Morris, 1930, chap. 1).

EU social policy is perhaps the most controversial aspect of European integration yet, despite all the political clashes on the matter, concepts like “social Europe” or “social dimension” remain ill‐defined and imprecise terms. Intends to outline and clarify in detail the debate about whether or not the European Union should have competence with regard to labour market affairs. A key message is that social policy has been controversial because it has become embroiled in the debate about the future political direction of the EU. In particular, three contrasting political models –symbiotic integration, integrative federalism and neo‐liberalism – have been put forward as organizing principles for the EU and each has a coherent view of what form social policy should take at the European level. It is the clash between these three models that has caused EU social policy to be so contestable and intractable.