Income is not a determinant of class. It can be used, however, as an indicator of class relations. Wage levels are usually, though not always, related to the type of positions people hold within the work-place, the type of work they do, the amount of power and influence they have over their working environment, conditions [...]

TASC did something quite unusual, even revolutionary: they looked up the facts. With all the unsubstantiated claims about labour costs, ‘Myths of the Irish Crisis: Wages and Competitiveness‘ is truly fresh air in a stale debate.  Here I reproduce the data from Eurostat which TASC uses to show that Irish labour costs in low-paid sectors [...]

New Capitalism? The Transformation of Work by Kevin Doogan (Wiley Press, 2009)
The subtitle of this book is slightly misleading: the book’s focus is not so much the transformation of work in recent years, but rather the distance between the discussion of work by academics, journalists, and politicians, and the material reality of work in the [...]

To a large extent, the reality of global inequality is ignored or at best downplayed. However, this has not always been the case. Indeed, in the early 1950s, the first UN resolutions on development focused on inequality rather than poverty. Unfortunately, this decline of interest in inequality is not an indication of any improvement in [...]

And so the battle is on. The cuts to social welfare and child benefit in Budget 2010 saw the government cross the Rubicon to a place where no ‘right’ is safe anymore. That means that the long-time target of employers’ groups, business lobbies and vested interest politicians - the minimum wage - is back on [...]

Today, ICTU and TASC published the Hierarchy of Earnings, Attributes and Privilege report (PDF) or H.E. A.P report, authored by Professor Terrence McDonough of The Dept of Economics, NUI Galway, (see recent ILR podcast interview) and Jason Loughrey. You can find  the full press release below. The full report deserves to be studied in detail [...]

Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (London: Penguin, 2009). xvii + 331 pp.
This brilliant book demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that economic equality is good for society. In doing so, it exposes the complete falsity of the dominant view that massive inequalities are a necessary [...]

Minister Lenihan warned the cuts proposed by An Bord Snip Nua would be a picnic compared to what future governments would have to implement.’
As we are all frog-marched down to the Finance Minister’s picnic, let’s see what effect cutting Child Benefit will have. For all the indications are that this payment is in the firing [...]

Maybe it’s the Leveller in me, but when times are hard we should all put our shoulder to the wheel, share out the pain and protect the lesser able in our community. Listening to the great debate over wages you’d think that everyone was a Leveller. There is so much ‘share the pain’ going around [...]

Spare a thought for Mary and Sean. Both work full-time - not great paying jobs but together they pull in 60K with overtime. They need it. They bought a house three years ago, paying over the odds, but with a one-year old child they had to leave their one-bed flat. Their second child came along [...]