Cutting workplace accidents and diseases to zero
The pandemic has focused attention on health and safety. But workers were already dying just trying to make a living.
Economy
Analysis and debate on the European economy: growth and investment, fiscal and monetary policy, trade, industry and inequality.
The price increases that matter for the poor
Rich-country governments are not adequately addressing the causes of food-price inflation—the world’s poor continue to suffer as a result.
Amazon and the power of big digital platforms
Dario Guarascio, Andrea Coveri and Claudio Cozza
Platform power is often traced to markets, implying anti-trust action. The source, and the solution, lie elsewhere.
First collective agreement for platform workers in Spain
The agreement follows a critical Supreme Court judgment and the ‘riders’ law’ deriving from social dialogue.
Not only a vaccine waiver: WTO reform is urgent
‘Intellectual property rights’ as the foundation of ‘free’ markets is a notion difficult, intellectually, to sustain.
Learning accounts—filling the training gaps
Individual learning accounts can make the right to training tangible for all but EU member states will need to raise their commitment.
Spain’s labour reform: less transience, more balance
While still subject to political negotiations, the labour-market reform agreed by Spain’s social partners should bring more security.
Higher public debt = lower growth?
The pandemic-induced crisis has seen fiscal policy relaxed. Ill-evidenced orthodoxy must not be allowed to reinstate austerity.
Digitalisation and telework—the ‘new normal’?
New working arrangements could hold out more self-determination for workers. Too often they have meant more stress.
The ECB needs a better narrative
Giving the public impression that inflation is ‘too low’, Peter Bofinger writes, is not a good look for the bank.
EU strategic autonomy must mean fairer trade
If ‘strategic autonomy’ is to define the EU’s relation to the world, linked trade deals must not mean dependence for workers.
The dark side of the logistics boom
Dorien Frans and Nadja Dörflinger
Online shopping is simple and convenient for customers. But the logistics workforce may pay the price.
Will European recovery ever be co-determined by social actors?
The EU’s plan for recovery offered an opportunity for meaningful involvement of social actors. The outcome? Patchy.
A better deal for the world’s workers
Boosting earnings and the dignity of work requires strengthening bargaining power and supplying good jobs to those who most need them.
European Commission takes the lead in regulating platform work
Valerio De Stefano and Antonio Aloisi
The draft directive published today is already breaking the united front of the platform companies.
EU borrowing—time to think of the generation after next
Rebecca Christie, Grégory Claeys and Pauline Weil
Financing post-pandemic recovery via EU borrowing has proved remarkably straightforward. So why keep it temporary?