America’s
growing temporary workforce
AMERICA’S
temporary help industry first emerged after the second world war, when
companies like Manpower and Kelly Girl Service began “renting out” office
workers on a short-term basis. In those early years, temps numbered in the
hundreds of thousands. Today, the industry employs some 2.9m people, over 2% of
America’s total workforce. Since the country’s economic recovery began in 2009,
temporary employment has been responsible for nearly one in ten net new jobs.
But as temping has grown, the quality of the jobs it provides has deteriorated.
According to government statistics, temps earn 20-25% less per hour than their
permanent counterparts in similar roles. And few are covered by health-care or
pension plans.
The
proliferation of ill-paid temp work also affects permanent staff. Many of the
costs that employers of temps avoid, such as health insurance, are now borne in
part by taxpayers in the form of increased social-benefits spending. Temp work
may also suppress the wages of permanent employees. In states where less than
2% of the workforce was employed by temping firms in 2000, full-time workers’
salaries grew by an average of 3% a year between 2000 and 2015. In contrast,
they rose by just 2.6% annually in states with a higher proportion of temp workers.
Such findings lend support to the view of David Autor of MIT that the use of
temping agencies, while beneficial to individual workers and firms, “may exert
a negative externality on the aggregate labour market—that is, it is a ‘public
bad’.”
New words:
first emerged : lần đầu xuất hiện
deteriorated : xấu đi
pension : tiền trợ cấp = allowance
wages : tiền lương
suppress : đàn áp
proliferation of : sự gia tăng của
According to government statistics: theo thống kê của chính phủ
New words:
first emerged : lần đầu xuất hiện
deteriorated : xấu đi
pension : tiền trợ cấp = allowance
wages : tiền lương
suppress : đàn áp
proliferation of : sự gia tăng của
According to government statistics: theo thống kê của chính phủ
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