Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Labor economics Australia'

One of the main underlying sources of economic growth is productivity. An economy can grow by either accumulation of its inputs, namely labour and capital, or improvements in productivity. The latter implies that more can be produced with the same amount of inputs, generating a greater amount of income that can be distributed among the economy's population. With rising per capita incomes, an economy can provide higher living standards and well-being. This thesis analyses variations in economic and productivity trends among the states of Australia and the USA. It investigates whether disparities in GSP per capita, labour and multifactor productivity among the states have declined (converged) or widened (diverged), during this period. The analysis is undertaken at a national level as well as for specific industries to identify the sectoral sources of the various trends. Further, in an interstate analysis the performance of individual states is examined to identify those that may have had a major role in accounting for the observed trends. The analysis employs both cross - section and time - series techniques. Contrary to earlier studies, this thesis finds that lately the interstate dispersion of per capita incomes and productivity has stopped decreasing. In Australia, once the Mining sector (which is a special case) is excluded from the analysis, the levels of GSP per capita and labour productivity in the various states are found to have neither converged nor diverged. Convergence trends among the US states observed prior to the 1990s have not only slowed down but even reversed into divergence. Divergence in labour productivity started during the 1980s in the service industries and was followed by the Manufacturing sector (and here in particular by the Electronic and Electrical Equipment industry) during the 1990s. There appears to be a belt of states in the West (and a few states in the North-East) which started off relatively poorly but managed to catch-up with the richer states due to an above average growth performance in labour productivity and multi factor productivity. Some of these states did not only manage to catch-up with richer ones but continued to surge ahead, causing the observed increase in the interstate dispersion in recent years. Policy makers, especially those in the states that are falling behind need to develop policies that will lead to an increase in the rate of productivity growth. In order to achieve this they must foster industries, which are conducive to higher growth rates and adopt policies that would increase the productivity of the labour force. These policies will need to create an environment in which productivity enhancing innovation can be sustained. States need to engage in research and development activities to ensure the invention and the adoption of new technologies.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Sydney, [2004?].
Title from title screen (viewed 30 May 2008). Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy to the Discipline of Work and Organisational Studies. Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print form.

Doctor of Philosophy
Female labour force participation has increased constantly over the last thirty years in Australia. A number of theories and an established literature predict that such an increase in the performance of paid work by women will lead to a redistribution of unpaid work between men and women in the household. There is little evidence, however, of a corresponding redistribution of unpaid work within Australian households, raising a number of questions about the process through which paid and unpaid work is distributed between partners. A review of the literature considers economic and sociological approaches to the domestic division of labour and how the distribution of paid and unpaid work between partners has been understood, measured and explained. This review identifies two related problems in the existing explanatory frameworks; one theoretical, and one empirical. First, existing explanatory frameworks make assumptions about either unilateral, exchange or bargaining decision making processes between partners, rather than empirically establishing the process through which decisions are made. These untested assumptions about the decision making process lead to an empirical problem, whereby the interpretation of empirical data relies on establishing associations between the individual characteristics of household members and the subsequent distribution of time spent on different tasks. By examining the decision making process that is subsumed within the existing explanatory frameworks, this thesis addresses a gap in the literature. Results in the established literature rely on the strength of assumptions about the decision making process in these explanatory frameworks and neglect alternative possibilities. More recent studies provide alternative explanations about the allocation of time within households which consider the independent behaviour of autonomous individuals as well as their perceptions and preferences about paid and unpaid work. These insights guide the construction of this study, with additional consideration given to how individuals perceive, anticipate and make decisions about work and family, taking account of both the established and alternative explanations for the allocation of time to paid and unpaid work. Specifically, the research question asks: what is the decision making process when allocating time to paid and unpaid work in the household? Two component questions sit within this, firstly: what type of decision is it – autonomous, unilateral, exchange or bargaining? And secondly: what is the basis for the decision – income, preference or gender? In order to counter the empirical problems identified in both recent studies and the established literature, and pursue the research questions, a qualitative strategy of data collection and analysis is implemented. Based on replication logic, a target sample of sixty respondents is constructed, containing ten men and ten women from each of three purposefully identified life situations; undergraduate, graduate and parent. This sample allows for the comparative analysis of results between and across samples of men and women drawn from different stages of work and family formation. Subsequently the interview schedule is detailed, along with the composition of the final sample, made up of male and female undergraduates, male and female graduates, mothers and fathers who are also graduates. The results of the interviews are presented in three separate chapters in accordance with the different life situations of the interviewees, namely male and female undergraduates, male and female graduates, and male and female parents who are also graduates. Following the three results chapters is a detailed analysis and discussion of the key findings in the final chapters. Findings from the research indicate that the decision making process is based on gender and operates independent of partners in an autonomous manner. Indeed, gender is seen to be pervasive in the decision making process, with gendered expectations evident in the responses of all men and women in the sample, and taking effect prior to household formation, before decisions about work and family need to be made. The findings demonstrate that, independent of one another, men and women have implicit assumptions about how they will manage demands between work and family. Men in the study are shown to be expecting to fulfil and fulfilling the role of breadwinner in the household, with a continuous attachment to the workforce, whereas women in the study are shown to be expecting to accommodate and accommodating additional care demands in the household, impacting on their attachment to the workforce. These implicit assumptions by men and women conspire to limit the range of options perceived in the household when decisions about work and family need to be made and prevent households from redistributing paid and unpaid work responsibilities between partners in accordance with their economic needs and preferences. These findings also highlight institutional constraints that prevent the redistribution of paid and unpaid work between partners, reinforcing the delineation in the division of labour between household members. In the process this study makes two key contributions to the existing literature, firstly with a method for the investigation of the hitherto untested decision making process, and secondly with findings that demonstrate an alternative decision making process to that which is assumed in the existing explanatory frameworks, which takes account of the gendered expectations of men and women independently.

One of the most discussed topics in labour and demographic studies, population ageing and stability, is closely related to fertility choices. This thesis explores recent developments in the fertility literature in the context of Australia. We investigate individual preferences for child bearing, the determinants of fertility decisions and the effectiveness of policies implemented by the government aimed at improving total fertility. The first study highlights the impact of monetary incentives on the decision to bear children in light of potentially differential responses across the native and immigrant population. The second study analyses the role of unemployment and job stability on the fertility choices of women. The final study examines whether the quality-quantity trade-off exists for Australian families and explores the impact of siblings on a child's health and educational outcomes.

There are many potential determinants of women?s labour supply including wages, unearned income, human capital endowments, demographic characteristics and family traits. Fertility behaviour, including the number of children and age of children, is also an important factor in women’s labour supply decisions. Many factors which affect women’s decisions on participating in the labour market and hours of work are also key influences on their decisions on starting a family and having a desired number of children. This thesis provides a comprehensive analysis of the determinants of labour supply and fertility behaviour of Australian women. Using cross-sectional data, labour supply models corrected for sample selection bias, and fertility models examining different aspects of family size, the thesis finds that women’s labour supply decisions are largely influenced by their wages and fertility behaviour. Their decisions on completed fertility, starting a family and having additional children are largely influenced by their actual or potential wages.

The thesis seeks to provide a deeper understanding of the dynamics of interaction between the environmental and labour movements, and the conditions under which they can cooperate and form alliances in pursuit of a sustainable development agenda which simultaneously promotes ecological and social justice goals. After developing an explanatory model of the labour-environmentalist relationship (LER) on the basis of a survey of theoretical and case-study literature, the thesis applies this model to three significant cases of labour-environmental interaction in Australia, each representing a different point on the spectrum from LER conflict to LER cooperation, during the period from 1983 to 1996. Commonly held views that there are inevitable tendencies to LER conflict, whether due to an irreconcilable "jobs versus environment" contradiction or due to the different class bases of the respective movements, are analysed and rejected. A model of the LER implicit in Siegmann (1985) is interrogated against more recent LER studies from six countries, and reworked into a new model (the Siegmann-Norton model) which explains tendencies to conflict and cooperation in the LER in terms of the respective ideologies of labour and environmentalism, their organisational forms and cultures, the national political-institutional framework and the respective places of labour and environmentalism therein, the political economy of specific sectors and regions in which LER interaction occurs, and sui generis sociological and demographic characteristics of labour and environmental actors. The thesis then discusses the major changes in the ideologies, organisational forms and political-institutional roles of the Australian labour movement which occurred during the period of the study, and their likely influence on the LER. The two processes of most importance in driving such changes were the corporatist Accord relationship between the trade union movement and Labor Party government from 1983 to 1996, and the strategic reorganisation of the trade union movement between 1988 and 1996 in response to challenges and opportunities in the wider political-economic environment. The research hypothesis is that the net effect of these changes would have been to foster tendencies towards LER conflict. The hypothesis is tested in three significant case studies, namely: (a) the interaction, often conflictual, between the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) and the environmental movement in debates around macroeconomic policy, economic restructuring and sustainable development from the mid-1980s onwards; (b) the complex interaction, involving elements of cooperation, disagreement and dialogue, between the environmental movement and the unions representing coal mining and energy workers in the formulation of Australia's climate change policies; and (c) the environmental policy and campaign initiatives of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union to improve workplace environmental performance and promote worker environmental education. The case studies confirmed the research hypothesis in the sense that, whilst the LER tended overall towards greater cooperation in the period of the study, the Accord relationship and union restructuring process worked to slow the growth of cooperative tendencies and sustain conflict over particular issues beyond what might otherwise have been the case. The Accord relationship served to maintain conflict tendencies due to the dominance of productivist ideologies within the ACTU, and the union movement's perseverance with this relationship after the vitiation of its progressive potential by neo-liberal trends in public policy. The tripartite Accord processes institutionalised a "growth coalition" of labour, business and the state in opposition to excluded constituencies such as the environmental movement. This was partially overcome during the period of the Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) process, which temporarily included the environmental movement as an insider in the political-institutional framework. The long-run effects of union reorganisation on the LER are difficult to determine as the new organisational forms of unions were not in place until almost the end of the period of the study. However, in the short term the disruptive effects of the amalgamations process restricted unions' capacity to engage with environmental issues. Pro-environment initiatives by the AMWU, and cooperative aspects of the coal industry unions' relationship with environmentalists, reflected the social unionist ideology and internal democratic practices of those unions, and the influence of the ESD Working Group process, whilst LER conflict over greenhouse reflected the adverse political economy of the coal industry, but also the relevant unions' less developed capacity for independent research and membership education compared to the AMWU. The LER in all three cases can be satisfactorily explained, and important insights derived, through application of the Siegmann-Norton model. Conclusions drawn include suggestions for further research and proposals for steps to be taken by labour and environmental actors to improve cooperation.

The period between the depression of the 1930s and the long post-war boom saw the development of the contemporary shape of the labour movement's economic thought, with its dichotomy between moderate and left nationalist currents. This development is examined in terms of the nature of the main organisations of the labour movement, economic conditions, the ideological proclivities of different classes and the levelof the class struggle. The main areas of economic thought examined are theories of Australia's place in the world economy, the class anatomy of Australian capitalism and of economic crises. During the late 1930s laborites continued to express a longstanding commitment to national development through tariff protection and wariness of overseas loans. Moderate ideas of the possibilities for overcoming class conflicts increasingly displaced radical Money Power theory after the depression. While monetary and real underconsumptionism continued to be the main explanations of economic crises offered by laborites, both ALP politicians and union officials became aware of Keynesian economics and the legitimacy it provided for longstanding Labor policies. The advent of the Popular Front period in the international communist movement saw the Communist Party of Australia move from a revolutionary internationalist towards a politically more conservative left nationalist position, sharing assumptions with Money Power theorists, despite the rise in the level of industrial struggle. The Communist conviction in radical underconsumptionist theory of inevitable economic crises began to weaken. World War II and the advent of the Curtin Government saw the leadership of the ALP embrace Keynesian economics and its priorities. This was expressed in both foreign economic and domestic policies, but was qualified by a keen appreciation of the requirements of the Australian economy for both protection and foreign markets and the level of the class struggle. The promotion of Keynesian ideas and divisions in the labour movement was successful after 1947 in countering working class militancy. While retaining a fervent nationalism the Communist Party's policies shifted after the War from strong support for the Government during the War to a very radical and anti-American position after 1947. Bolstered by a return to radical underconsumptionism and a focus on the conspiratorial role of the Collins House monopolists, the Party believed it could challenge the authority of the ALP and the Chifley Government, on the basis of working class industrial struggles. But the Communist Party made its attempt when the level of united struggle was already in decline. Between 1949 and 1952 the balance of class forces shifted sharply in favour of capital. Moderate laborites have continued to accept the main propositions of orthodox economics, while the bulk of the left in the labour movement has been nationalist and, after the Communist Party's break with Moscow, committed to a version of Keynesian economics. Although the adequacy of both approaches to working class interests is in doubt and they have not consistently promoted its struggles, their hegemony over the labour movement has not prevented the emergence of militant working class action.

The broad objective of this thesis is to develop an understanding of factors affecting outsourcing in the hotel industry and also the role played by management accounting in hotel outsourcing. The thesis draws on transaction cost economics (TCE), agency, contingency, and labour process theories in the context of appraising factors motivating outsourcing. Two empirical phases have been undertaken in the study. The first phase involved a series of interviews with general managers and financial controllers in large South East Queensland hotels. The second phase involved two distinct questionnaire surveys of large Australian hotels. The first was administered to hotel general managers, and the second was administered to hotel financial controllers. Significant findings arising from the study include: 1. In light of the substantial international literature describing hotel outsourcing, it appears that outsourcing in Australian hotels is relatively limited. This appears to be particularly the case with respect to food and beverage related activities. 2. Mixed support is offered for the TCE model. Both the survey and interview data provide some support for TCE's prescription that frequently conducted activities will not tend to be outsourced. Two specific extensions are offered to this aspect of the model, however. Firstly, where activities are conducted to a minimal extent, it can be uneconomic to outsource. Secondly, where large activities are undertaken by a group of organisations, their enhanced purchasing power can result in inexpensive outsourcing arrangements. With respect to TCE's uncertainty proposition, support is offered for the view that the propensity to outsource will be greater where behavioural uncertainty is lower. No support has been offered with respect to environmental uncertainty. The interview data provides some support for TCE's asset specificity proposition, however, minimal support was found in the survey phase. Despite this, the many dimensions of asset specificity (eg. site specificity, human asset specificity, etc) provided a useful checklist of issues to be considered in relation to the outsourcing decision. 3. Negligible support was found for labour process theory (LPT) in the interview phase of the study. In light of this, and the need to narrow the study’s focus in the survey phase, LPT was not pursued further. LPT is a difficult construct to operationalise, given the social desirability error that may result. This may partially account for the absence of significant LPT findings in the interview phase. 4. The survey data provides some support for the agency theory view that risky activities will tend to be outsourced. 5. Considerable cross-hotel variation exists in management of, and accounting's involvement in, outsourcing decision making and control systems. Accounting appraisal of outsourcing proposals rarely includes long term oriented, sophisticated techniques such as "net present value". It appears this may be because outsourcing decisions are not conducted in the context of the formal capital budgeting process. 6. High performing hotels and hotels that conduct their outsourcing decisions in the context of a long term outsourcing strategic agenda have more sophisticated outsourcing management systems.

Bibliography: leaves 135-143. An anthropological analysis of an industrial dispute that occurred within the East Gippsland forest industry, 1997-1998 and how the workers strove to acheive better working conditions for themselves, and to share in the wealth they had created.

Australia may present a special case in the analysis of strikes because, for most of the Twentieth Century, the Australian Industrial Relations Commission has acted as an industrial "umpire" charged with keeping the industrial peace. We begin with a review of major contributions to the theory of strikes, and reestimations and evaluations of the time-series models of previous Australian researchers. We then develop theoretical models of strikes and non-strike industrial action, stemming from Marshall's (1920) contribution to the theory of wages. If higher real wages lead to lower levels of employment, union demands are likely to be greater, and industrial action more frequent, when the duration of unemployment of retrenched workers is shorter. Important determinants of the opportunity costs of wage demands to employees, are wage losses of retrenched employees during unemployment and in subsequent re-employment. Critical in the union's decision to threaten a strike or a non-strike action, is a permanent loss of market share directly associated with strikes. The model of strikes is tested, along with variables suggested by other theories, using time-series data from the period 3:1959 to 4:1992. We show that the model is robust and out-performs modified versions of other Australian models. We find that the Prices and Incomes Accord is associated with a reduction in strike activity, but that other researchers have over-estimated its impact. Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey data is used to produce cross-sectional models of strikes and non-strike actions in unionised workplaces. We test the importance of the opportunity costs of wage demands and strikes, using variables describing the firm's competitive environment and local labour market conditions. Because the objectives of workplaces differ, we estimate separate models for privately owned workplaces, government non-commercial establishments and government business enterprises. All empirical models are broadly consistent with the predictions of our theoretical model.

The principle tenet of this Study is that place and its role in social process is poorly understood. This is a serious problem in human geography where one of the major tasks is to elucidate the spatial elements in social process. The resulting difficulties are compounded in empirical analysis where the spatial and social are highly disaggregated. Any response must, therefore, address these features of the problem if the situation is to be redressed. A twofold response was formulated. The first, concentrates attention on labour exchange as a key element of social process and investigates spatial differences from the highly disaggregated local perspective. The second involves transferring Tukey's philosophy of EXPLORATORY DATA ANALYSIS to geographical research. This has been done to overcome analytical rigidities which impede progress where theory concept or dat a are sufficiently suspect as to cause uncertainty. Implementation of this strategy progresses from comparatively simple and conventional treatments of place in labour exchange to more sophisticated examinations which explore spatial aspects of differentiation in controlled analytical environments. Substantive investigation of labour exchange, from an exploratory point of view, provides powerful insights into the role of place in labour exchange because it is less constrained than conventional treatments. These insights are manifest through analyses of extent and nature in differentiation between places. Results are of three types: structure in place and social process which establish a prima facie case for more general analysis; structure of place in a widely defined social environment; structure in social process which is sufficiently general as to sustain hypotheses of ubiquitous spatial structure. These interim findings, of merit in their own right, combine to provide a sound foundation for proposition of a model relating place to social process. This model is significant because it reverses the principal tenet of traditional empirical models, which reduce place to the status of an analytical convenience, and argues that it is inherent in considerations of social process.

Throughout the period 1931-1949, the Australian Labor Party tended to be preoccupied with the role of money as a cause of, and cure for, economic instability. The party was very much influenced by a long tradition of economic thought which saw the business cycle as an essentially monetary phenomenon. In part, this tradition affected the A.L.P. through the influence of 'quack' writers in the 'monetary radical' tradition, who combined a monetary view of the business cycle with a fear of financial manipulation and a commitment to the abolition of interest. At least as significant as this unorthodox. influence was, however, the impact upon Labor thinking of the monetary views of the main school of expansionist economics of the 1920s. Labor's preoccupation with money was due in no small measure to the way in which much of the 'mainstream' economic debate focussed upon money in the 1920s and into the 1930s. Labor economic thinking was not suddenly transformed as a result of a 'Keynesian revolution' following the publication of the General Theory in 1936. The party had absorbed much of the 'Keynesian' policy message - in particular, about the centrality of counter-cyclical public works - well before 1936. Nevertheless, because of its long attachment to purely monetary theories of capitalist economic instability, Labor did not readily absorb the 'Keynesian' view of the way in which the economic mechanism operates. The party was, for example, inclined to view public works not so much as an instrument of 'fiscal' policy, as a conduit for monetary expansion. Even in the 1940s, the A.L.P. remained deeply imbued with the traditional view that monetary mechanisms played an all-important role in the economy. In government, Labor's ideological zeal was directed towards banking reform. By contrast, Labor politicians were not greatly interested in the issues (concerning the role of planning in normal peacetime economic management, and the form and social content of a full employment program) which were dividing economists and public servants at the time.

The 1907 Harvester decision effectively established a minimum wage in Australia for men based upon the needs of a family. Commencing in the 1940s Australia has progressively introduced transfer payments to provide support for children and for a parent in a caring role. In 2014 the minimum wage was defined as that for a single person. This thesis is concerned with the rationale of the original decision and the transition between these two states. The Harvester decision was embedded in the economic and family structure of the day, and in the contribution domestic production made to both living standards and the capacity of a partner to engage in paid employment. In turn, this was underpinned by the nature of domestic technology. The form of the family wage had weaknesses. It was inefficient in meeting its objective of supporting families and involved lower wages for identifiable groups who were not likely to need to support a family (young men and women). However, alternative approaches to family support had not been developed at that time, nor were there suitable institutional arrangements to enable the payment or funding of such assistance. The transition was slow. Reasons for this include: the speed of permeation of technology for more efficient domestic production; opposition to state financial intervention in families; the need for changes in the structure of employment to encompass part-time work; and at times resistance from organised labour. This resistance was motivated by seeking to protect employment, both of men and single women and because change effectively involved a redistribution of income with losers, as well as winners. In this, the union role can be seen as being representative of the interests of their members. A further challenge related to the interaction of claims for equal pay, and provision for wives without children engaged in domestic production. More generally the institutions involved operated independently with no coordination and change was incremental, building a path determinacy into the development of policies. A number of long-term time series data were developed specifically for this thesis. These data (detailed in appendices) underpin the descriptive and econometric analysis presented and themselves constitute a contribution to the literature. They show that over the period the real value of the minimum wage has increased, although falling relative to other earnings, and with evidence of significant trade-offs of potential gains, in favour of reductions in working time and retirement income. The expansion of family support has significantly boosted household incomes for those with children, and addressed the equity of relative outcomes for families on the minimum wage compared with single workers. Although conceived of in the context of ‘New Protection’, econometric analysis shows a long-term negative (but non-causal) relationship between the wage and manufacturing protection, with the wage rather being driven by improved productivity. A negative relationship is found between the wage and unemployment, with bi-directional causality.

This thesis explores the labour market situation of low paid and unemployed adults in Australia during the mid-90s. The aim is to document evidence of the experiences of these individuals, with a view to understanding whether, in the Australian labour market, some workers may be trapped in a cycle of low pay and no pay. In short, have some workers become part of a secondary labour market in jobs where they have limited opportunities for sustained employment and earnings progression? This empirical investigation is undertaken within a dynamic framework. It unfolds evidence about the experiences of the low paid and the unemployed in the Australian labour market with both descriptive and econometric techniques and using data from a longitudinal survey, The Survey of Employment and Unemployment Patterns. The major themes examined include the dimensions and characteristics of low paid employment, earnings mobility and patterns of labour market transition of the low paid and the unemployed, job durations and the role of casual and part-time work on future employment prospects for the unemployed. Finally, this study takes a policy perspective and undertakes a detailed evaluation of how a specific government initiative may assist individuals who have become entrenched and reliant on income support in the Australian labour market. The main findings of this thesis indicate a diversity of experiences of low paid workers and the unemployed in the Australian labour market. For many, low paid work is a temporary experience. However, the cumulative evidence of this thesis also substantiates a significant negative relationship between previous unemployment, low pay and the labour market transition patterns of workers in the Australian labour market. The conclusion is that some workers are trapped in a cycle of intermittent work, involuntary job separations and unemployment. Information gathered about what may contribute to this labour market situation suggests an important role for the increasing incidence of casual and part-time work in the Australian labour market. While it is found that these jobs provide valuable work opportunities for the unemployed particularly in low paid work, the evidence suggests that over time, they may not be associated with a pathway to more secure permanent jobs. The broad implication of the findings of this thesis is that some individuals are trapped in a repeating cycle of low pay and no pay. Once entrenched, the extent to which this cycle can be broken by government intervention may be limited according to the policy evaluation undertaken in this thesis. Therefore, understanding more about this cycle and the labour market experiences of the low paid and the unemployed over the longer term should remain an important concern for policy in this country.

Over the last three decades, Australia and many other industrialised nations have seen major social and economic changes. For Australia, two of these have been increasing inequality of earnings and the growth in alternative forms of employment arrangements. For the US and a number of other countries, the prevailing explanation for the increase in inequality centres on the notion of skill-biased technological change (SBTC). This view is based on the consensus that technical change favours more skilled workers, as new technologies evolve and are introduced into workplaces. This explanation relates the increases in earnings inequalities to a shift in demand towards highly skilled workers and away from less skilled workers, and centres around the concept and measure of skill. In this context, this thesis investigates three central issues that relate to dimensions of inequality in the Australian labour market. First, has there in fact been increasing skill bias in the demand for labour, and how should skill best be measured in addressing this issue? Second, if increasing skill bias is confirmed, is there any evidence that this increase in relative demand for high skill labour is an important explanatory factor in the rise in earnings inequality? Third, can the increasing role of casual and part-time work in Australia be interpreted as, in substantial part, a response to skill bias in the demand for labour, and as indicative of rising inequality in the labour market? The main findings of the thesis are as follows. For the first question, there is evidence of skill-bias in the demand for labour both in the long and short term in total and full-time employment. Although there was clear evidence of skill bias in full-time employment for men and women, the extent was not homogenous across different job types. Secondly, earnings inequality continued to increase in occupations for men and women between 1989-1995 and 1997-2002, irrespective of the type of inequality measures employed. Moreover, in trying to explain the causes of increasing earnings inequality in full-time work, the analysis found that the O*NET measures of skill and knowledge provided some tentative evidence that supports the skill bias hypothesis in Australia. Thirdly, in the exploration of the relationship between skill bias, alternative job types and earnings inequality, the thesis finds some indicative evidence to suggest that the process of job type creation may imply a new dimension of increasing earnings inequality in the Australian labour market. The broad implications of these findings are tied to both increasing earnings inequality in full-time earnings and in household income inequality. This is particularly so for those households whose majority of members are low skilled and are dependent on casual and part-time work, and who on average work a small number of hours.

Talent management is a source of competitive advantage and will be achieved by those organisations that are able to attract, develop and retain best in class individuals. It is thus not just a human resources issue but rather an integral part of any organisation’s strategy. Due to negative perceptions about South Africa, skilled workers are immigrating to countries such as Australia to the detriment of the South African economy. This loss is not necessarily being replaced by graduates or through immigration. Government policies such as Broader- Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE), Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) and Affirmative Action (AA), compound the issue by then decreasing the pool of skilled applicants that may occupy skilled and senior posts in organisations. Globally there is a shortage of skills and due to employee mobility they can use any opportunity that presents itself. The objectives of this study was to determine the factors which lead to the emigration of skilled South African’s to Australia and then once these factors are known to propose retention strategies to role players to stem the emigration tide. To achieve these objectives a survey was prepared based on previous studies and a link to the web questionnaire was distributed to the population via an Australian immigration agent. The link was sent to all the agent’s clients around the world and thus consisted not only of South Africa respondents but also elicited international responses, which will be used for comparison purposes only. Only 48 South Africans responded to the survey and although limited, it was sufficient for the purposes of this study. The demographic profile was mainly male and dominated by Generation X. Using a Likert scale respondents were questioned on their levels of satisfaction in their country of origin and in Australia through an adaptation of a study by Mattes and Richmond (2000). The study of Hulme (2002) was adapted and incorporated into the questionnaire, where respondents were given the opportunity to rank considerations for leaving South Africa and factors that would draw them back. Respondents were provided with the opportunity for responses to open-ended questions to include other considerations for leaving and factors that would draw them back. Results from these survey items revealed that the primary reasons driving skilled South Africans to emigrate was safety and security, upkeep of public amenities, customer service and taxation. In contrast, South African migrants had high levels of satisfaction with safety and security, upkeep of public amenities and customer service in Australia. Respondents indicated that factors that would draw them back to South Africa would be improvements in safety and security and government, followed by family roots, good jobs and schools. The study also looked at the permanence of the move. If skilled individuals returned with new-found skills and experience then it could be a potential brain gain for South Africa. The results of this study found that 43% of respondents had no intention to return, 42% did not supply a response and only 10% were undecided on whether to return or not. To attract, retain and develop talent, the South African government and the private sector would need to work in partnership to develop policies that would satisfy the lower-order needs of individuals, such as physiological and safety needs.
Emigration of skilled South African migrants to Australia
Business Management
M.Tech. (Business Administration)

Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
The last two decades have brought well-documented shifts in the spatial structure of Australia's economic growth not just in favour of Australia's cities, but within certain suburbs of these cities. Of interest is the extent to which spatial dependence in the form of neighbourhood interactions between closely situated suburbs, independent of other characteristics, may explain the diverse trajectories of ‘well-performing’ and ‘poorly performing’ suburbs over the period. This thesis examines the proposition of spatial dependence in suburb-level labour market outcomes of two Australian cities, Sydney and Melbourne, over the fifteen year period 1996-2011. Using four waves of census data the study begins by looking for significant clusters of socio-economic outcomes within Sydney and Melbourne. It employs Exploratory Spatial Data Analysis techniques (Anselin, 1995) capable of identifying significant global and local spatial autocorrelation. At the suburb-level in both Sydney and Melbourne positive spatial association in unemployment and labour force participation rates is found in both 1996 and 2011. Over our study period these ‘hotspots’ have shifted closer to the urban periphery, confirming Hulse et al.,’s (2014) finding regarding the spread of socio-economic disadvantage more generally. In Sydney and to a lesser extent Melbourne suburbs there is also evidence of strong positive global and local spatial association of education, industry and occupational variables, with spatial clustering increasing for a number of variables over the period 1996 to 2011. Having identified spatial clusters of labour market outcomes which represent significant deviations from a random pattern, we next examine the drivers of this clustering. Spatial econometric techniques (Anselin, 1988; Lesage and Pace, 2009 and Elhorst, 2014) offer a suite of models with endogenous and exogenous interaction effects, in addition to providing a framework for multivariate analysis. Results using a cross-sectional and panel approach in the context of unemployment rates, and the panel approach in the context of labour force participation rates reveal that commonly identified supply-side factors explain much of the variation in suburb-level labour market outcomes observed in both cities. Industry and occupation factors such as a suburb’s share of workforce in the manufacturing sector, and service-related and professional occupations are also significant. However we confirm the presence of significant spillovers between unemployment rates and labour force participation rates in neighbouring suburbs net of these controls. We also confirm spillovers operating on the basis of several notable socio-economic variables. The policy implications of our findings are considered in the concluding chapter.

This thesis examines internal union and external factors affecting union relations with Aboriginal workers in the wool and cattle sectors of the South Australian and Northern Territory pastoral industries, from union formation in the nineteenth century to the cold war period in the 1950s.
PhD Doctorate

O objectivo deste trabalho é avaliar o nível de literacia financeira e seu impacto no empreendedorismo entre os empresários da província da Matola. Para elaboração deste estudo, adoptou-se o questionário complementado por entrevista, visando avaliar o nível de literacia financeira entre os empresários do distrito da Matola. A educação e a formação, tanto no ensino primário como no ensino secundário, com ênfase na literacia financeira e nas habilidades empresariais podem ter implicações significativas para o desenvolvimento e o crescimento das pequenas, micro e médias empresas. Com efeito, o documento revela que a literacia financeira entre os jovens empresários do distrito da Matola é satisfatório e contribui de forma significativa para suas habilidades de empreendedorismo. Este trabalho é o primeiro a estudar o nível de literacia financeira entre os empresários do distrito da Matola e como tal estabelece uma referência importante para novas pesquisas nesta área.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the level of financial literacy and its impact on entrepreneurship among entrepreneurs in Matola province. For the preparation of this document, the questionnaire was supplemented by an interview to evaluate the level of financial literacy among the entrepreneurs of Matola province. Education and training, both in primary and high school, with an emphasis on financial literacy and entrepreneurial skills, can have significant implications for the development and growth of small and medium-sized enterprises. We find that financial literacy among young entrepreneurs in Matola District is medium and contributes significantly to their entrepreneurship skills. This work is the first to study the level of financial literacy among entrepreneurs in Matola District and as such establishes an important reference for new research in this area.

This thesis examines the role of social capital in Australian regional development. It does so though a case study of one of the most socio-economically disadvantaged regions in Australia, the City of Playford, (perhaps best known as the former City of Elizabeth and home of South Australian Manufacturing). The approach taken involves an examination of the historical roots, more recent academic and political debates, along with the structural political and economic conditions which have inspired the rise of social capital. This is accompanied by an exploration of the application and implications of the social capital approach to development in the City of Playford. Recent years have seen an explosion of interest in social capital theory. Of particular interest to policy makers has been the suggestion that there is a link between social capital and economic development. This argument has lent support to the idea that inequality in regional economic development can be tackled by building social capital in disadvantaged regions. In this thesis I take a critical approach to both the concept ‘social capital’ and the link between social capital and economic development. I suggest that the popularity of social capital may be due more to the political and academic environment in which the concept was spawned, than its ability to address issues of inequality in regional development. The results of the case study in the City of Playford highlight the continuing importance of issues of class and structural inequality in Australian regional development. I argue that contemporary applications of social capital in regional development are not only unable to adequately address such issues, but may also be contributing to their exacerbation. Having drawn attention to the inherently problematic nature of the concept, I then discuss the implications of the research findings for the future of social capital in both policy and social theory.
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Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Adelaide, School of Social Sciences, 2008

This research incorporates a model of labour demand into a computable general equilibrium model for Australia. It extends the underlying model by disaggregating the price of labour into (1) ordinary wage costs, (2) payments for overtime hours and (3) fixed costs of labour. It also distinguishes the labour input into hours worked per worker and the number of workers. This research developed a model of labour demand where firms chose between increasing the number of hours worked per worker and paying overtime wage premiums which increase with overtime hours or expanding the size of their workforce and paying fixed costs for each additional worker. A labour services function was adopted to represent the aggregate quantity of labour so that an additional hour per worker had a differing marginal product than an additional worker. A two-stage least squares model of wage premiums and overtime was estimated to represent Australia’s industry-specific overtime regulations based on the set of modern awards and collective bargaining agreements. This provided a relationship between the average wage premium per hour of overtime and the number of overtime hours performed. This was used to calibrate the labour demand model integrated into the CGE framework. The Australian government has a compulsory retirement savings scheme, the superannuation guarantee, which requires employers to set aside a portion of an employees wage income to provide income support in retirement. The effects of increasing the superannuation guarantee from 9.5% to 12% of employees ordinary wage earnings is simulated using the labour demand model developed within this research. It demonstrates how industries respond to the increase in the superannuation guarantee by substituting away from workers to additional hours per worker. The main findings are that industries with (a) higher fixed costs, (b) higher levels of ordinary hours and (c) flatter wage premium schedules comparatively experience larger increases in overtime.