Irene Mandl

Irene Mandl is from Austria where she worked in policy-oriented socio-economic research in the field of employment/labour markets as well as entrepreneurship and industry analysis before joining Eurofound as research manager.

Irene Mandl

New forms of employment in Europe—how new is new?

Irene Mandl 15th December 2020

Standard employment is not simply being replaced by non-standard work. But work is becoming more diverse and policy must accordingly become more tailored.

Platform Work – Breaking Barriers Or Breaking Bad?

Irene Mandl 7th November 2018

If you’ve ever ordered a taxi through an app, taken a pizza delivery from a guy on a bike or searched a website for a plumber to unblock your drain, you’ve probably witnessed platform work first hand. The ability to order a service online is quickly becoming a commonplace and platform work is clearly filling a […]

New Forms Of Employment Offer Both Benefits And Risks

Irene Mandl 27th March 2015

Social and economic changes in Europe have given rise to new forms of employment, many very different from traditional ‘work’. What are these new trends, and how do they affect working conditions and the labour market? Irene Mandl of Eurofound examines the findings of a special report. The huge increase in the use of zero-hours […]

The Politics of Unpaid Work

This new book published by Oxford University Press presents the findings of the multiannual ERC research project “Researching Precariousness Across the Paid/Unpaid Work Continuum”,
led by Valeria Pulignano (KU Leuven), which are very important for the prospects of a more equal Europe.

Unpaid labour is no longer limited to the home or volunteer work. It infiltrates paid jobs, eroding rights and deepening inequality. From freelancers’ extra hours to care workers’ unpaid duties, it sustains precarity and fuels inequity. This book exposes the hidden forces behind unpaid labour and calls for systemic change to confront this pressing issue.

DOWNLOAD HERE FOR FREE

Teleworking experiment

Is Europe’s teleworking experiment coming to an end?

A new episode of the Eurofound Talks podcast looks at data from the Living and working in the EU e-survey showing a decline in the number of respondents engaged in remote work, with the percentage of people working entirely from the workplace increasing from 36% in 2023, to 41% in 2024.

Listen to the episode for free. Also make sure to subscribe to Eurofound Talks so you don’t miss an episode!

Progressive Ukraine

The policy brief series by FEPS and FES on Feminist Foreign Policy (FFP) offers timely insights into how the EU can advance gender-sensitive and sustainable peace agreements in a time of mounting militarisation.

While current measures being considered are framed as necessary responses to geopolitical instability, especially concerning Ukraine, there are significant concerns from an FFP perspective and broader security critiques.

We highlight five urgent considerations:

Feminist considerations for EU security and defence
Reversing cuts to feminist movements
Learning from Latin America’s Feminist Foreign Policy
Placing Feminist Foreign Policy at the heart of EU External Action
Embedding FFP into EU Foresight Practices

READ THE SERIES

WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2023/2024

Real wages in the European Union continued their decline in 2023—despite an acceleration in nominal wage growth and falling inflation rates. For the current year, there are only tentative signs of a slow recovery in the purchasing power of wages.

A resumption of real wage growth would stabilize the functional distribution of income and strengthen domestic demand. However, even under this benign scenario, the crisis is far from over from workers' point of view. They have borne the brunt of real income losses associated with the energy-price shock resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The lingering reduction in real wage levels means that wage policy still needs to catch up to contribute to a fairer distribution of the burden between labor and capital.