WP 36 - Women's Preferences or Delineated Policies? The development or part-time work in the Netherlands, Germany and the United Kingdom



Mara Yerkes & Jelle Visser

Concluding this section, we observe that part-time jobs in the Netherlands are neither atypical nor
flexible
, though the diffusion of part-time jobs is likely to have increased the aggregate flexibility of
the Dutch labour market, bringing in more diversity in working time patterns. The ‘normalisation’ of
part-time is supported by the current process of ‘negotiated flexibility’ in working-time regimes,
encouraged by various central, sectoral and company-level agreements. In recent times, these
agreements offer a “choice” or “à la carte” menu to individual workers - supporting the possibilities
of “working time” accounts or banks, the exchange of money for time, or time for money. Yet,
limited childcare facilities remain a crucial factor. Demand for childcare grew steadily, but it took
until 1987 before unions, under pressure of their female members, began to negotiate childcare
facilities in collective agreements (Tijdens
et al., 2000). By its own admission, the Dutch welfare state
does rather poor, in comparison with other countries, in supporting young families (SZW, 2000).
According to the Central Planning Bureau, the official Dutch economic forecasting institute, the lack
of and cost of childcare facilities can become a constraint, limiting labour supply and putting pressure
on wages (CPB, 1998). There is also the issue of falling birth rates and the high average age at which
women give birth. Finally, although the Netherlands implemented relevant EU legislation on parental
leave, in the private sector such leave is often unpaid. Like the absence of full-day schooling in some
(rural) parts of the country, this structures the choice towards part-time rather than continuing in a
full-time job after a labour market interruption.

17


AIAS - UvA



More intriguing information

1. Delivering job search services in rural labour markets: the role of ICT
2. The Composition of Government Spending and the Real Exchange Rate
3. The Impact of EU Accession in Romania: An Analysis of Regional Development Policy Effects by a Multiregional I-O Model
4. Categorial Grammar and Discourse
5. Peer Reviewed, Open Access, Free
6. Public infrastructure capital, scale economies and returns to variety
7. TOMOGRAPHIC IMAGE RECONSTRUCTION OF FAN-BEAM PROJECTIONS WITH EQUIDISTANT DETECTORS USING PARTIALLY CONNECTED NEURAL NETWORKS
8. Mortality study of 18 000 patients treated with omeprazole
9. Governance Control Mechanisms in Portuguese Agricultural Credit Cooperatives
10. Conditions for learning: partnerships for engaging secondary pupils with contemporary art.
11. Has Competition in the Japanese Banking Sector Improved?
12. A Computational Model of Children's Semantic Memory
13. The name is absent
14. Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines
15. Towards Learning Affective Body Gesture
16. Evolutionary Clustering in Indonesian Ethnic Textile Motifs
17. The name is absent
18. Regulation of the Electricity Industry in Bolivia: Its Impact on Access to the Poor, Prices and Quality
19. Announcement effects of convertible bond loans versus warrant-bond loans: An empirical analysis for the Dutch market
20. The name is absent