How to achieve a harmonious society?
The New York Times reported on a new labor law in China.If the law gives more power to the All-China Federation of Trade Unions to negotiate, does that mean good things for workers or more jobs for Vietnam and Indonesia? Or both?
What forces are pushing these changes?
China Passes a Sweeping Labor Law
"China’s legislature passed a sweeping new labor law today that strengthens protections for workers across its booming economy...
"The new labor contract law, enacted by the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, requires employers to provide written contracts to their workers, restricts the use of temporary laborers and makes it harder to lay off employees.
"The law, which is to take effect in 2008, also enhances the role of the Communist Party’s monopoly union and allows collective bargaining for wages and benefits...
"The law is the latest step... to increase worker protections in a society that, despite its nominal socialist ideology, has emphasized rapid, capitalist-style economic growth over enforcing labor laws or ensuring an equitable distribution of wealth...
"But it may fall short of improving working conditions for the tens of millions of low-wage workers who need the most help unless it is enforced more rigorously than existing laws, which already offer protections that on paper are similar to those in developed economies.
"Passage of the measure came shortly after officials and state media unearthed the widespread use of slave labor in as many as 8,000 brick kilns and small coal mines in Shanxi and Henan provinces...
"It also moves China closer to European-style labor regulations that emphasize fixed- and open-term employment contracts enforceable by law...
"Moreover, the law empowers company-based branches of the state-run union or employee representative committees to bargain with employers over salaries, bonuses, training and other work-related benefits and duties.
"In the past, workers have had to negotiate wages with their employers individually..."
Dan Harris, writing on China Law Blog, suggests that laws are one topic and that implementation is another.
China's New Labor Law: Enforcement Is The Key
"The Christian Science Monitor just quoted me in a very fine article written by Jude Blanchette on China's newly enacted labor law, entitled, Key issue for China's new labor law: enforcement:
"'As is always the case with China's laws, the real questions will be in whether the new laws are enforced, how they are enforced, and against whom they are enforced, says Dan Harris, an expert at the law firm Harris & Moure.
"'But, he adds, "there is a feeling the new labor law is more likely to be enforced than the old and, in particular, will be enforced against foreign companies.'..."
posted by Ken Wedding @ 7:15 AM
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