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Author: David Peetz

  • The curious incident of low wages growth

    Unions & Collective Bargaining, Wages & Entitlements

    The curious incident of low wages growth

    Wages and Policy in the 21st Century Report No. 1
    by David Peetz

    Author

    David Peetz

    Laurie Carmichael Distinguished Research Fellow

    A new Carmichael Centre report by David Peetz considers why wages growth has been so low, despite a tight labour market and a brief surge in inflation.

    Asking why has there been no wages explosion, Peetz finds the answer lies in loss of power.

    The report documents how workers have lost power in the past two decades, with almost every change in the economy taking away workers’ bargaining power.

    From 2014 to 2022 most government policies took away workers’ bargaining power. The most recent industrial relations reforms in 2022-2024 shifted the pendulum back some way towards workers. These laws increased workers power and have also boosted wages growth.

    The analysis shows that all workers have had their wages damaged by lack of power. And all workers have been able to recover some ground since the recent industrial relations laws have come into effect.

    • Australian workers can no longer obtain the wage increases that they previously could from wage negotiations. Workers do not contribute to inflation.
    • Changes in power have combined to normalise low wages growth, for both union and non-union workers, even in tight labour markets. Of 16 developments in the labour market and economy over the past 50 years, 14 signalled deterioration in worker power, one an improvement in power for female workers only, and one an improvement only from 2010 until 2023 (lower unemployment).
    • The one countervailing force in recent times has been public policy which, since 2022, has led to some increases in workers’ power. Analysis of 34 policy events showed that the majority of those before 2022 further reduced workers’ bargaining power, while almost all of those since then have increased workers’ power.
    • In March 2014 wages were 53.0% of national income, but by December 2022 they had fallen to just 50.3%, before recovering to 53.5% by September 2024.
    • Wages grew at a little over 2% per year through most of the period from 2013-14.  After September 2022, they grew more quickly, to over 4% per annum throughout 2023-24.
    • The wage gains associated with increased worker power are not just restricted to unionists, but they are likely greater for unionists than non-unionists.



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  • Employee voice and new rights for workplace union delegates

    Unions & Collective Bargaining

    Employee voice and new rights for workplace union delegates

    Impacts on wages, productivity, cooperation and union training
    by David Peetz

    Author

    David Peetz

    Laurie Carmichael Distinguished Research Fellow

    Media release



    New union rights to boost workplace cooperation

    A workplace delegate is a worker chosen to represent workers who are union members in dealings with management. Delegates are volunteers who perform their union duties on an unpaid basis in addition to their normal job at work. Delegates spend their time undertaking vital tasks for workplace representation.

    Some employers have actively placed barriers in the way of volunteer union delegates and paid officials. One study in the early 2000s found that 23% of delegates found management
    hostile, while 22% of delegates reported that management opposition to their role as a delegate had become more intense over the previous two years. Examples from various case studies, including court and industrial cases, illustrate some of the ways in which that minority of employers from workplaces with delegates expressed their hostility towards unionism and their opposition to delegates, including by placing barriers in the way of workplace union activists and delegates.

    The new regime of workplace delegates’ rights is very likely, overall, to increase the voice of employees, and thereby have positive consequences, over the long run, for pay and conditions, union membership, workplace cooperation, grievance resolution and productivity. However, the effects of new rights for paid union training leave depend very much on union responses, in particular on their subsequent reliance on classroom versus informal training and the ‘follow up’ of classroom education.



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    Factsheet
    New union rights to boost workplace cooperation

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  • A Better Future for Self-Employment

    Gig Economy, Employment & Unemployment

    A Better Future for Self-Employment

    How is it changing, and how can ‘gig’ work be regulated?
    by David Peetz

    Author

    David Peetz

    Laurie Carmichael Distinguished Research Fellow

    Media release



    New Report Reveals Changing Face and Future of Self-Employment

    This report considers and challenges two common myths about self-employment.

    The first is that self-employment is inexorably growing. The second is that self-employment cannot, or should not, be regulated in order to protect self-employed workers and improve the conditions of their work.

    This new report from the Carmichael Centre at the Centre for Future Work shows that, in reality, self-employment is not growing inexorably — in fact, in most countries (including Australia) it is declining.

    The much-trumpeted surge in self-employment and ‘freelancing’ is a myth. However, the nature of self-employment is changing: fewer self-employed people are running successful independent businesses, and more are engaged in precarious ‘solo’ activities like short-term contracting and part-time ‘gig’ work.

    The report also shows that some forms of self-employment can be regulated to protect affected workers, provided two simple and important criteria are satisfied: the workers are vulnerable and hence need protection, and a viable mechanism exists that enables their work to be efficiently regulated.

    The report reviews the proposed provisions of the second part of the federal government’s new Closing Loopholes legislation, which would allow for minimum labour standards to be applied to digital platform workers and owner-operators in the transportation sector. The new legislation (to be considered in Parliament in 2024) is an appropriate and effective response to the challenges facing these two groups of ‘gig’ workers.

    Please see the full report, “A Better Future for Self-Employment: How is it changing, and how can ‘gig’ work be regulated?,” by David Peetz, Laurie Carmichael Distinguished Research Fellow at the Centre for Future Work.



    Full report




    Factsheet
    New Report Reveals Changing Face and Future of Self-Employment

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