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EUROCIETT / UNI EUROPA PAN -EUROPEAN CONFERENCE:
TEMPORARY AGENCY WORK AND
TRANSITIONS IN THE LABOUR MARKET
Brussels, 19 December 2012
SUMMARY OF STUDY FINDINGS
Eckhard Voss
in cooperation with:
• Institute for Employment Studies (UK)
• IRES Rome (Italy)
• ORSEU, Lille (France)
• Lentic – Ecole de Gestion de l'Université de Liège (Belgium)
Overview of the study
 Systematic review of data and research on how TAW contributes
to facilitating transitions in the labour market, in line with the
concept of “making transitions pay”
 1st layer: Overview of TAW in EU27
 Gathering comparable data and information on TAW on the basis of
existing data, focussing on:
 Dynamics of TAW during the last decade
 Regulatory frameworks
 Profile of TAW workers
 Working conditions and equal treatment
 Industrial relations, collective bargaining and social dialogue
2nd
layer
analysis
1st
layer
analysis
Case
studies
 2nd layer: In-depth analysis of 6 countries
 Following a comparative format of contents and data
 Review of results regarding TAW and labour market transitions
 Role of social partners and social dialogue
 3rd layer: Case studies of labour market transitions





Unemployment to work
Temporary to permanent work
Education to work
Target groups
Role of social partners
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Temporary agency work in Europe
Penetration Rate
 In 2010, according to CIETT Economic report 2012, the total number of temporary agency
workers worldwide was 10.4 million in FTEs; Europe accounted for 35%, i.e. 3.6 million
 Share in total employment in EU27 today is around 1.4% on average with significant
differences
 Cyclical nature of TAW: employment trends before, during and after the crisis
 Between 2000 and 2008, the TAW workforce increased by more than 47% while total
employment increased only by 7.8%
 Most significant relative increases between 2000 and 2008 in PL, FI, IT, DE and AT
 Increase also in matured markets such as UK (18.8%), NL (32.2%) or BE (29.6%)
2.0%
 Employment reduction
in TAW due to the 2008
1.8%
crisis was much stronger
1.6%
than in overall
1.4%
employment (-17.5%
1.2%
compared to -1.8%)
1.0%
 Since 2009 however,
0.8%
the TAW sector again
0.6%
experienced a growth that
0.4%
was stronger than
0.2%
employment growth in
0.0%
general
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
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National legal and other frameworks of temporary agency work
 Temporary agency work is very heterogeneously regulated across Europe
 There are differences in what is regulated – for example, whether or not this embraces
reasons for using TAW, prohibited sectors, maximum assignment length, or stipulations
concerning the employment contract, training and representation rights.
 Maturity: in nearly half of the EU member states, regulation started only during the last
decade
 Impact of the European Directive on TAW:
 Development of a common understanding of temporary work agencies, temporary
agency workers, user companies, assignments etc.
 Defining a legal framework in countries where it hasn’t existed so far
1960s
• Netherlands
(1965)
• Denmark (1968)
1970s
1980s
• Ireland (1971)
• Austria (1988)
• Germany, France
(1972)
• Portugal (1989)
• United Kingdom
(1973)
• Belgium (1976)
1990s
2000s
• Sweden, Luxembourg
(1994)
• Finland, Greece ,
Hungary, Slovakia (2001)
• Spain (1994)
• Slovenia, Poland,
Romania (2003)
• Italy (1997)
• Czech Republic, Malta
(2004)
• Latvia (2007)
• Estonia (2009)
• Bulgaria, Lithuania (2011)
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Profile of tempoary agency workers
 Gender
• Range from quite balanced shares (IT, NL, PL) to high shares of female TAW (UK, FI, DK, SE) and
countries characterised by the contrary (DE, AT, BE)
 Age
• Young people have a high share in TAW, but the share of older workers is increasing
 Sector composition
• Strong bias towards manufacturing in countries such as DE, PL, CZ, while in UK, NL or ES more
than 50% of temporary agency workers are employed in services
• Apart from economic structures also a result of regulation and existence of other more flexible
forms of employment contracts
 Target groups
• In particular people with a migrant background, long-term unemployed and peopole with a lower
qualification/education profile
 Other aspects:
• Length of assignments and average duration of contracts with the agencies differs quite
significantly - resulting also from regulatory frameworks (synchronisation, part-time/open-ended
contracts etc.)
• Motivation of becoming a TAW worker: “spring boarders“ being the largest single type of agency
workers but there are also others that do not look for permanent/direct work (“flexprofessionals“, “extra earners“, students)
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Industrial relations and collective bargaining
 IR mirrors variety and different models in Europe
 Two broad groups may be identified:
 Social dialogue driven practice: In countries such as the
Netherlands, Belgium, France or Italy both employers’
associations and trade unions are playing an important
role in regulating temporary agency work, defining
certain minimum standards and payment conditions
and levels. Social partners in these countries are
involved in dialogue, consultation and bargaining at all
relevant levels and have established special funds and
other joint institutions of self-regulation
 Market driven practice: Experience the practice in other
EU countries is characterised by either weak or nonexisting structures of dialogue and bargaining at
sectoral or cross-sectoral level and much weaker social
partners in terms of mandate and representativeness.
Here, bargaining at best is taking place at
micro/company level and working conditions and
labour standards are mainly driven by legal minimum
standards
 This division is also reflected in the general picture of
industrial relations and collective bargaining where two
broad groups exist:
Countries, where
employers’
organisations of the
TAW sector are involved
in collective bargaining
(11 countries)
Only TAW employer
associations in place
without a bargaining
mandate (15 countries)
Austria, Belgium,
Denmark, Finland,
France, Germany,
Italy, Luxembourg,
Netherlands, Spain,
Sweden
Bulgaria, Czech Republic,
Cyprus, Estonia, Greece,
Hungary, Ireland, Latvia,
Lithuania, Poland,
Portugal, Romania,
Slovakia, Slovenia,
United Kingdom
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Temporary agency work and transitions in the labour market
 EU Directive:
“(TAW) contributes to job creation and to
participation and integration in the labour
market”
 Temporary agency work
as a “bridge” and/or a “stepping stone”
 Problems and difficulties
 Methodical problems: often control groups are missing; control of different variables and
determinants
 Studies based on large samples/data sources exist in all countries but mainly from a
descriptive perspective
 A large number of surveys are based on smaller numbers of interviews amongst
temporary agency workers, agencies and user companies
 As comparative data/studies don’t exist, it is not possible to quantify stepping-stone
effects for an aggregated sample of EU countries
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Temporary agency work and transitions from unemployment to work
 High proportion of formerly unemployed as well as people without any previous
professional experience (e.g. in FR or BE around 40%, in Germany more than 60%)
illustrate the important role of TAW in regard to transitions from unemployment to work
 A growing share of people enter the labour market from unemployment or for the first
time via temporary agency work – in NL or BE around 30% of formerly unemployed
persons find a job via temporary agency work
 Studies based on larger statistical analysis confirm “bridging” effect of temporary agency
work, but in most cases are descriptive studies based on timing of events surveys, i.e.
describing the share of formerly unemployed persons that find work through TAW and
stay in work for a longer period of time
 Only few studies have tried to estimate a “net effect” of the stepping-stone/bridging
function by comparing unemployed who returned to work via TAW with the path of those
who took alternative routes back into work
 The results of these surveys illustrate either no significant difference (NL study
based on CWI data 2001 - 2005) or a slightly positive effect (DE study based on
statistics of the federal labour agency) in comparison to other routes
 Due to methodical differences, the results are not comparable
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Temporary agency work and transitions into permanent employment
 Stepping stone effect of temporary agency work is an issue of debate in employment
policy reform as well as between social partners
 Various research confirms that there is a stepping-stone effect
 Studies come to quite different results regarding “adhesive effects” (both at user
companies as well as in other direct employment), e.g. Germany 7-12% (1st half of 2008)
 Belgium study (covering 2005 – 2008): insertion rates of 30% (after one year), 41% (after
two years) and 55% (after three years)
 A type of research that would
be needed more:
A Dutch study based on LFS
data (1996 – 2010) addressed
the question what form
of flexible employment
offers the best prospects for
permanent employment
 More longitudinal studies
illustrate that stepping-stone
effects vary significantly
depending on the labour market
situation
Source: Ronald Dekker/Hester Houwing/Lian Kösers: Van flexibel naar
vast? De doorstroom naar vast werk van een groeiende groep
flexwerkers, CBS, Den Haag, 2011
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Temporary agency work and transitions from education into work
 Young people (including those in education) are an important and sometimes the most
important age group within the TAW workforce
 Share of under 25 years old is high in NL (46%) and BE (37%); in FR, IT and DE are more
than 40% are younger than 30 years old
 TAW a more and more important entry into the first job: In France in 2010, 84% of those
under 25 years entering the labour market via TAW have never worked before; in
Germany, 10% of those entering the labour market for the first time in 2011 did so via
TAW;
 Only few research studies has compared the trajectories of young people within TAW
with those choosing alternative ways
 Certain groups of young people rely much more on temporary agency work than others
as an entry channel into work and find it easier or more difficult to make further
transitions
 For young professionals temporary agency work may be an attractive way to gain
work experience with different employers and develop careers
 For young people with low qualification and educational attainment, temporary
agency work often is the only chance on the labour market and they find it difficult
to make further transitions into direct employment if this is not actively supported
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Temporary agency work and target groups



For persons belonging to target groups (e.g. older employees, persons with
education/qualification level/profile that doesn’t match labour market needs, migrants and
ethnic minorities) temporary agency work provides an important bridge into the labour market
France: share of older workers increase twice as much as average number of TAW workers; for
more than 90% TAW provides a useful possibility to find a job
Belgium: TAW increases the chance to find direct/permanent employment also for persons
belonging to target groups
Low qualification
Source: IDEA Consult 2009
Ethnic minorities
 Important role of TAW for labour market integration is also illustrated by many initiatives
developed by the temporary agency work sector either unilaterally or in cooperation with
public employment administrations
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The role of social partners for fostering transitions in the labour market
 The role of social partners is pivotal for “making transitions pay” as they complement
regulation on temporary agency work and develop initiatives to enhance the quality of
transitions
 Bipartite funds so far are the only
mechanisms/institutions
that focus on skills development
and employability of temporary
agency workers at sector level
 In France, 80% of temporary
agency workers state that
training measures undertaken
were useful to find the current job
 Bipartite funds and other joint
initiatives as well as collective
bargaining agreements are also
important to enhance the employment conditions of temporary agency workers
 Regular monitoring and reviewing of training activities are a further important aspect of
bipartite training funds that also identifies challenges and further needs, e.g. stronger
concentration of activities for temporary agency with a low educational profile or no
vocational qualification
 But: Our sample of countries is not representative
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Assessing the impact of social dialogue on temporary agency work
ROLE OF SOCIAL
DIALOGUE
NETHERLANDS
STRONG
BELGIUM
FRANCE
DENMARK
STRONG TO
ITALY
AUSTRIA
GERMANY
SWEDEN
FINLAND
LUXEMBOURG
MEDIUM ROLE
SPAIN
PORTUGAL
WEAK ROLE
POLAND
IRELAND
GREECE, HUNGARY , SLOVAKIA
UNITED
KINGDOM
SLOVENIA, ROMANIA
CZECH REPUBLIC MALTA
WEAK TO NO
LATVIA, ESTONIA
ROLE AT ALL
BULGARIA, LITHUANIA,
CYPRUS
1960S
1970S
1980S
1990S
2000S
MATURITY OF
REGULATION
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Conclusions
1. The study confirms that temporary agency work is a form of employment that not only
contributes to the fluidity (flexibility) of the labour market but also provides opportunities
in particular for unemployed persons and target groups as a bridge into work
2. The question of “what fosters quality transitions” is more difficult to assess – here, apart
from the economic climate, the labour market structure and regulatory framework of
temporary agency work, social dialogue and initiatives and practices developed by social
partners and established by collective bargaining at national/sector level seems to play a
key role.
3. Our study shows that in particular in those countries which have established bipartite
funds and related initiatives, these also have triggered follow-up activities such as
monitoring, surveys amongst temporary agency workers and in general a strong interest
in issues such as training, skills development and employability
4. Against this, and the fact the main challenge for the future will be to broaden good
practice experience and initiatives that complement legal regulatory frameworks by joint
initiatives and practice of social partners
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Contact
Eckhard Voss
Senior researcher and partner
wilke, maack und partner
Schaarsteinwegsbrücke 2
D-20459 Hamburg
[email protected]
Fon: +49(0)40.432787 41
Fax: +49(0)40.432787.44
www.wmp-consult.de
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