Keyword: misemployment

An Employment Contract that Violates Human Rights

Picture: OSG Global Issues Blog Anna Majavu - May Day 2015 has just been observed and celebrated by the global community, but around the world, including here in South Africa, hundreds of thousands of workers are toiling under “zero hours” contracts where they can get jobs, but never actually work or be paid. Under zero hours’ contracts, workers have to guarantee their availability to employers, but in effect remain on unpaid standby all week waiting to be called to work. A zero hours contract worker may eventually only...

Misemployment

Picture: School of Life Video What is misemployment? The School of Life has come up with a handy concept to describe human value, which seems to be ignored in unemployment debates. Whenever unemployment comes down, it sounds like really good news. It's great that productive forces in the economy are growing and there'll be a little more money in people's pockets. But if one gets a bit more ambitious about human potential, the picture become more complicated. Misemployment means being in work, but of a kind that fails to...