Job quality and labour market performance

Job quality and labour market performance | 3

hal-00616771, version 1 - 24 Aug 2011

mainly in a fourth cluster composed of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Slovakia,
Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania.

In contrast to the standard results encountered in the institutionalist comparative literature
(Amable, 2003, Esping-Andersen, 1990),² the so-called liberal model disappears: the United
Kingdom is included in the northern cluster, while Ireland joins the continental cluster. This
counter-intuitive result reflects the existence of functional equivalences across different
institutions and/or policies that are equally successful in improving job quality.

The northern cluster is on the right hand side of Figure 1, being characterised by high
participation rates in education and training and high employment rates, already close to (or
even above) the EES targets for 2010. Mean wages are relatively high compared to the
European average and job satisfaction is also higher than in other countries: almost 90% of
workers are satisfied with their working conditions. Childcare facilities are very well developed
in these countries compared to the rest of Europe and part-time work is more developed in this
cluster, particularly in the Netherlands. These characteristics are illustrated by the descriptive
figures presented below. However, there is one specific point on which countries from this
cluster are slightly worse-off compared to the EU average: the intensity of work (tight
deadlines, very high speed) is higher than in other clusters.

Figure 1. A map of job quality in the EU27 (2005-2006)

Facteur 2 - 16.50 %

Greece φ

Portugal

Poland

Romania

Hungary

Bulgaria

Slovakia

Czech Republic

Latvia

Lithuania

Estonia

Malta ⅛

Italy

Spain

France

Ireland

Luxembourg

Belgium

Germany

Cyprus

Austria

Netherlands

Slovenia

Finland

United Kingdom

φ Sweden

Denmark

Coupure 'b' de l'arbre en 4 classes

• Classe 1/4 8

* Classe 2/4 5

Classe 4/4 9

Facteur 1 - 26.38 %

Source: Labour Force Survey, Davoine et al., 2008b, Employment in Europe 2008, chapter 4.

² Esping-Andersen’s typology distinguishes three main clusters: the liberal model, the social democratic
model, and the conservative model. Amable’s typology, which is based on a larger set of variables,
identifies five models of capitalism: Liberal, Nordic, Continental, Mediterranean, and Asian.