{"title":"Why are (financialised) workers becoming more resigned and conformist and less claimants? Empirical evidence for Portugal","authors":"Ricardo Barradas","doi":"10.15847/dinamiacet-iul.wp.2023.03","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The deregulation and flexibilisation of labour relations has been on the active neoliberal agenda of policymakers all over the world, including in Portugal. Against this backdrop, labour conditions have been worsening since the 1970s and 1980s, and workers have progressively lost some labour rights, which is noticeable in stagnant (or falling) wages, the rise of personal income inequalities, the proliferation of atypical work, the increase of precariousness, the surge of emotional abuses in the workplace, the deterioration of work–life balance and the spread of informal work. Nonetheless, workers have evidenced higher resignation and conformism and lesser claimant behaviour in order to demand higher wages and better labour conditions, which is visible in the strong reduction in strike activity in the last four decades. Our argument asserts that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels restrain their demands for higher wages and better labour conditions due to the fear of decreasing their income and losing their jobs and the consequent risks of default. This paper aims to assess the relationship between workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels and their strike activity by performing a time-series econometric analysis focused on Portugal during the period of 1979 to 2021. We conclude that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels have a negative effect on strike activity in Portugal, both in the short term and in the long term, especially on strike volume and strike duration. We also conclude that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels have been one of the main drivers behind the decline of strike activity in Portugal in the last four decades.","PeriodicalId":1,"journal":{"name":"Accounts of Chemical Research","volume":"10 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":16.4000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Accounts of Chemical Research","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.15847/dinamiacet-iul.wp.2023.03","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"化学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"CHEMISTRY, MULTIDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The deregulation and flexibilisation of labour relations has been on the active neoliberal agenda of policymakers all over the world, including in Portugal. Against this backdrop, labour conditions have been worsening since the 1970s and 1980s, and workers have progressively lost some labour rights, which is noticeable in stagnant (or falling) wages, the rise of personal income inequalities, the proliferation of atypical work, the increase of precariousness, the surge of emotional abuses in the workplace, the deterioration of work–life balance and the spread of informal work. Nonetheless, workers have evidenced higher resignation and conformism and lesser claimant behaviour in order to demand higher wages and better labour conditions, which is visible in the strong reduction in strike activity in the last four decades. Our argument asserts that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels restrain their demands for higher wages and better labour conditions due to the fear of decreasing their income and losing their jobs and the consequent risks of default. This paper aims to assess the relationship between workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels and their strike activity by performing a time-series econometric analysis focused on Portugal during the period of 1979 to 2021. We conclude that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels have a negative effect on strike activity in Portugal, both in the short term and in the long term, especially on strike volume and strike duration. We also conclude that workers’ financialisation and indebtedness levels have been one of the main drivers behind the decline of strike activity in Portugal in the last four decades.
期刊介绍:
Accounts of Chemical Research presents short, concise and critical articles offering easy-to-read overviews of basic research and applications in all areas of chemistry and biochemistry. These short reviews focus on research from the author’s own laboratory and are designed to teach the reader about a research project. In addition, Accounts of Chemical Research publishes commentaries that give an informed opinion on a current research problem. Special Issues online are devoted to a single topic of unusual activity and significance.
Accounts of Chemical Research replaces the traditional article abstract with an article "Conspectus." These entries synopsize the research affording the reader a closer look at the content and significance of an article. Through this provision of a more detailed description of the article contents, the Conspectus enhances the article's discoverability by search engines and the exposure for the research.