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      THE GLOBAL UNEMPLOYMENT PANDEMIC AND ITS CONSEQUENCES FOR INCOME DISTRIBUTION

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      World Review of Political Economy
      Pluto Journals
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            Abstract

            The article considers the intensifying global unemployment crisis—now particularly acute in face of the global financial crisis—in the context of the technological transformation of the world economy since the 1970s, driven mainly by the electronic and digital "revolutions." This has led to an ever rising structural labor surplus—along with a corresponding rise in the structural excess of capital. The resulting rise in productive capacity beyond the market's absorptive capacity must now be seen as permanent. Consequently the model of global economy based on a competitive struggle for markets is no longer tenable, given that a growing proportion of actual or potential capacity is bound to remain unutilized. The problem is further exacerbated by ever more severe environmental constraints to economic growth. Since public policy can no longer be based on the priority of maximizing production and growth it follows that in future access to markets and shares of value added must be regulated on the basis of equitable distribution. This means that the state must assure a minimum standard of income security to all citizens as of right, while opportunities for earning additional income must be effectively rationed within a more collectivist economic and social framework.

            Content

            Author and article information

            Journal
            worlrevipoliecon
            10.2307/j50005553
            World Review of Political Economy
            Pluto Journals
            2042891X
            1 July 2010
            : 1
            : 2
            : 264-274
            Article
            10.2307/41942919
            b93429d5-4d40-47e2-9ead-588bb8d7e69a
            © WORLD ASSOCIATION FOR POLITICAL ECONOMY 2010

            All content is freely available without charge to users or their institutions. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission of the publisher or the author. Articles published in the journal are distributed under a http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

            History

            Political economics

            Notes

            1. International Labour Organization, Key Indicators of the Labour Market (KILM), September 2007.

            2. OECD, Average Hours Actually Worked, April 2007 (www.swivel.com/data_sets/show/1004949).

            3. OECD, Harmonized Unemployment Rates, Economic Outlook, July 2009.

            4. Professor Richard Layard, "Clues to Prosperity," Financial Times, February 17, 1997; Richard Benson (Speciality Finance Group LLC), "Hard Times," www.goldseek.com, July 9, 2009.

            5. C. P. Chandrasekhar and Jayati Ghosh, "Jobless Growth in Chinese Manufacturing," www. macroscan.org/fet/may07 (statistical data derived from China Statistical Yearbook 2007).

            6. Andy Mukherjee, "India Badly Needs Jobs; Companies Hire Robots," www.bloomberg.com, June 1, 2006.

            7. "On Human Rights Day: 25 Million Filipinos Denied Right To Work," IBON Special Report, December 8, 2009.

            8. André Gorz, Farewell to the Working Class (London: Pluto Press, 1982); Jeremy Rifkin, The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era (New York: Penguin, 1995).

            9. "Prosperity Without Growth? The Transition to a Sustainable Economy," Sustainable Development Commission, London, 2009, p. 12.

            10. Notably in The Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848).

            11. First enacted in the British Limited Liability Act of 1855.

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