Labour

Capital Calls: Continental, Harley-Davidson

8 Feb 2022

Concise views on global finance: German car-parts maker Continental may spin off its self-driving unit, while the iconic maker of motorbikes has turned supply shortages to its own advantage.

Andrew Bailey pay rise clanger has tiny PR upside

7 Feb 2022

The Bank of England chief’s call for wage restraint has gone down badly with workers facing soaring prices. The ensuing controversy, has, however, done more to inform the public about the central bank’s mission to control inflation than many past communications campaigns.

Capital Calls: Wizz investor sides with workers

7 Feb 2022

Concise views on global finance: Denmark’s AkademikerPension picks an odd moment to offload its stake in the $6 bln budget airline over a lack of union representation among its staff.

Rio Tinto’s cultural fix will be an uphill dig

2 Feb 2022

The $117 bln mining giant is rife with bullying and racial and sexual abuse, according to a damning report. Miners’ improved safety records show reform is possible, if hard. Investors’ apparent indifference, though, makes prioritising workplace respect even tougher.

Christine Lagarde will win rate rise timing tussle

19 Jan 2022

Money markets imply the European Central Bank will hike twice this year, even though its boss says policy tightening is unlikely in 2022. She will have to work hard to convince markets, but reason is on her side. Wage pressures are less evident in the euro zone than in America.

Big Quit sends world’s back office back offshore

24 Dec 2021

When the pandemic fades, and along with it the stigma of letting people go, the WFH revolution will embolden global employers to move jobs to low-cost centres again. While that should benefit India’s IT services providers, they’re ironically grappling with similar problems.

Zuckerberg has metaverse rivals who mean business

23 Dec 2021

Meta Platforms and Epic Games are trumpeting visions of an immersive, 3D internet. But even ignoring the technological challenges, consumers’ appetite for full-on virtual socialising is uncertain. The corporate world is a more manageable target – and that is Microsoft’s domain.

Scarce U.S. workers can be found on Etsy

17 Dec 2021

Millions of Americans ditched their jobs and became self-employed in the pandemic, with about 20% in retail. Outlets like crafts-seller site Etsy benefited. But businesses are strained and competing to pay for workers. Resolutions – like increasing immigration – only help so much.

Longer weekends are the next economic battleground

10 Dec 2021

The United Arab Emirates is slicing half a day off the working week while companies experiment with shorter hours. A lasting shift requires a majority to follow, even as tech makes it harder to log off. But post-pandemic workers may be more willing to trade labour for leisure.

EU gig economy faces lengthy fight with Brussels

9 Dec 2021

Draft rules would reclassify up to 4 mln of the bloc’s freelancers as employees. That will raise costs and dent demand for firms relying on the self-employed. Ride-hailing and food-delivery groups can tweak business models or argue in court. The winner won’t be clear for years.

VW’s CEO soap opera is darker than Tesla’s

7 Dec 2021

Herbert Diess is likely to stay as the German carmaker’s boss but with wings clipped after a clash with unions. His ambitious battery plans make Volkswagen a more credible rival to Elon Musk’s firm. Unlike the Tesla founder’s antics, its leadership dramas reflect deep challenges.

Review: An antidote to the cult of busyness

3 Dec 2021

The pandemic focused minds on life’s brevity. Oliver Burkeman delves into fruitful approaches to using that limited time in “Four Thousand Weeks”. It’s an articulate reflection on distraction, the joyless urgency of productivity hacks, and why keeping options open may be futile.

Central Europe is monetary policy’s control test

8 Nov 2021

The Czech, Polish and Hungarian central banks are hiking interest rates, the traditional riposte to rising inflation. In contrast, peers in major economies are responding less aggressively to price pressures. That makes for an interesting experiment.

Covid, guns, drugs fuel irreparable labor shortage

3 Nov 2021

U.S. employers are scrambling as a record 4.3 mln people quit their jobs in August. The past year-plus also brought some 900,000 deaths from the virus, shootings and overdoses. And 2 mln more retired than expected. Even those capable of returning need more than just higher wages.

Capital Calls: Microsoft vs. Apple, U.S. consumers

29 Oct 2021

Concise views on global finance: The software giant overtakes the iPhone maker to become the world’s most valuable company at $2.5 trln. Meanwhile, slower U.S. consumer spending in September is likely to be temporary; inventory glitches are bigger problem for Apple, Amazon.

Capital Calls: Worker shortages spread to IT staff

14 Oct 2021

Concise views on global finance: It’s not just lorry drivers and warehouse labourers who are in short supply. British white-collar recruiter Hays on Thursday reported record revenue from finding technology employees.

Nobel rewards rigour in messy real-life tests

11 Oct 2021

The three winners of the economics prize aimed to spot cause and effect when actual events create experiments that lack lab-style controls. David Card’s work on wages and immigration, in particular, is newly relevant as workers seek higher pay and dislocations like Brexit unfold.

Tepid jobs report obscures promising U.S. trends

8 Oct 2021

Payrolls grew by 194,000 in September, well below forecasts. But the unemployment rate fell to 4.8% and average monthly job gains this year are about 560,000. The Fed won't be rushing to cool the economy. But declining Covid cases should help the recovery keep going.

Trucker shortage turbocharges haulage payments IPO

28 Sep 2021

Eurowag has built a lucrative business planning routes and handling payments for haulage firms. A dearth of drivers makes it more important to minimise empty trucks. Even a top-gear 1.7 bln euro valuation leaves mileage for investors in the Czech company’s upcoming London float.

UK trucker shortage tows inflation in its wake

27 Sep 2021

The government is recruiting foreign drivers, suspending competition rules and may use the army to ease a fuel crunch which triggered panic buying. That should limit the hit to Britain’s road-dependent economy. But sharply higher wages will accelerate annual inflation towards 4%.