Write an Essay On The Future of Work in the Digital Age

Introduction: Precarious work

Unfortunately, there is a legal definition. The term, precarious work but the term regularly describes precarious work as non-standard or temporary employment, poorly paid, insecure or unprotected, and therefore unable to support a household. (Work Rights Centre,2021) To go more in-depth the term comes into play when employees of a company/firm are not aware of their employment status, this could be a lack of an employment contract where it could be written in contract where all employment benefits, wages, shifts, hours, leave, etc. Basic employment rights like paid leave or even breaks aren't met because employers are looking for cheap workers who are impressionable and don't know much about basic work rights. There are worse cases of precarious work where employers/workers are paid cash in hand, (National minimum wage act,1998) below the national minimum wage and who may or be working illegally or on the black market. Precarious work is common around the world but there are lots of cases of it in Australia, insecure work can come in all shapes and sizes, around thirteen million Australians are in the workforce. But there is still a large percentage of that number that still fall into employment categories that can sometimes offer little job and financial security, (Edward Cavanaugh, 2020). The risk is temporary work and independent contractors, often this is through one of nearly four thousand labor fire firms more workers become vulnerable day to day oscillations of the market, which means they are limited to their entitlement. From a study conducted by the Mckell Institution, they have concluded unemployment is low, but underemployment and underutilization rates remain concerningly high.

Dimensions/Indicators:

There are many small factors that can indicate precarious work, for instance casual, temporary, indirect, and zero-hours contracts are all terms that would describe precarious work. This type of work is increasingly being used to replace a direct and permanent job, this then has a consequence that reduces or even worse abandons their responsibility to its workers. With many different types of indicators that can shine a light on precarious work, for example, fast food chains how are employees treated? How is the roster managed, a good example of shift management is when employers talk to their employees to have a stable consistent roster in which shifts are guaranteed instead of coming in when called upon. With shifts not rostered properly, employees are subject to precarious work because shifts are not guaranteed which means, they could go two days to two weeks without a shift. This would affect the individual dramatically, with rent, electricity, water, and other bills, etc. With vulnerability with shifts, this drops into precarious work due to no consistency to shifts. In addition, measurements of precarious work employment have more than one dimension related to that concept. (Industri All,2019). Many factors come into play when precarious work is mentioned this includes vulnerability, temporariness, and the ability to exercise basic workplace rights.

Comparison Precarious work:

The two dimensions of precariousness chosen for perceptions of employment conditions are confirmed as a two-factor structure aligning with previous precarious employment dimensions, factors such as insecurities, vulnerability, and some small indicators are based on health.

Precarious work comes in all different shapes and sizes. It will happen in almost every industry out there. Whether it's fast food, fashion, sales, or trade workers. For instance, Sales workers are becoming more precarious due to many reasons, insecurity, the conditions, and the lack how to control in that industry. In this sort of work placement, precarious work is on the rise due to those small factors that contribute together that make it insecure for new employees. Whereas the technical and trade workers have become more stable because of job security and the skills required to be a part of that industry. With this industry needing more workers/employees the term precarious doesn't get placed because benefits will be included, and hours are guaranteed due to the service provided. Whereas working a government job role like a bank, or insurance company is still considered to be a relatively safe option. (Statics,2018) Industries that have the lowest rate of precarious work employment are known to be public industries, financial, insurance, and utilities. Industries such as those have predominately lower rates of precarious work with many reasons contributing to most of these services being required daily which means it is needed in the workforce. Then there is the other side of the spectrum where jobs such as food and accommodation, fishing arts, and recreation are much more precarious for employees.

Effects on Individuals/society

The effects of precarious work on an individual can be intense and alarming, for many people who participate in precarious work, having a job that is in the unknown and uncertainty of their future employment can pervade many aspects of an individual's life. This can lead to higher levels of stress, the feeling of powerlessness, and much lower levels of motivation and autonomy. This can lead to mental health in some cases, where an individual starts to feel completely powerless bringing their overall self-esteem and morale. (Annual reviews,2019)

As for the workers who are affected by precarious work, this can have a greater effect than shown on display. These kinds of affect show because a higher level of dissatisfaction is shown, as well as stress which is incorporated into the mix this can have detrimental effects. More adverse health outcomes start to get generated with workers in a more secure work environment. Many people are affected by precarious work It has many effects that will leave the individual with doubts, powerlessness, uncertainty, and finally job security.

Precarious work impacts the future of work:

Research conducted by (Bell and Blanchflower,2011) found that when individuals are involved in precarious work during early labor market experience was associated with an increased chance of experiencing employment in the latter years. This is incorporated with low lifetime earnings, with this comes a lower level of job satisfaction, life satisfaction, and overall health approximately at the age of fifty.

If precarious work continues to rise, it will have a very bad effect on the oncoming generation when it comes to the workforce. A research study was conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics back in twenty seventeen on people who graduated from school in two thousand and six. The unemployment rate was at 10.1% for people ages 15 to 24 years, with underemployment being 13.7%. (ABS,2017) This is the effect of precarious work.

Preventing And overcoming Precarious Work:

There are many small steps that help contribute to stopping precarious work, one step is simply joining a union, whether you're in a contract, agency or even outsourced. A union has been very effective when it comes to the way to secure employment. Resist outsourcing, basically defending permanent jobs such as mining. Public pressure is also a good way to shed light on precarious work, in the UK zero-hour contracts, mean no guaranteed hours and require employees to be available on demand. This was the trend from 2010 (Industri,2019) and it then peaked in 2016 with 1.7 million workers on a zero-hour contracts. What the union did is mount together to form a campaign, which included lots of social media exposure about the conditions in, big distribution centers. Protests are being held outside these shops that used and abused these exploitative contracts. With this much attention, Zero-hour contracts become a major political issue and the vast number of people on them dropped to lessen than three hundred thousand. Overall, there are many ways to slowly stop precarious work, because it is a real problem, and thousands if not millions of people around the world suffer from it.

Overall:

Lastly, precarious work is something every individual has to go through or has experienced in their time, it some instances it might have made the individual look for another job, speak up, or try something different, or it made an individual feel taken advantage by their employers, made to feel vulnerable and have a sense of uncertainty. These things can affect the individual financially, mentally, or even physiologically. But it's what one does to overcome a sense of insecurity in their choice of work, there are many ways one can express their issues with precarious work, such talk to a manager, and making it known you want guaranteed hours. How the next generation can overcome this issue is coming together and shedding light whether this going on social media or shredding the word with banners, posters, etc. Precarious work is something we all can get through with the right help and dedication it can slowly deuterate.

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