The Invisible Employees – Inclusion and exclusion on the Danish Labour Market

Abstract

It is rather paradoxical that the Danish labour market model is viewed, on the one hand, as being very flexible, implying a relatively low legal or other regulation of job protection, thus giving employers ample opportunities to dismiss employees (contrary to conditions in Continental Europe), while at the same time, almost one in ten employees are temps or in other kinds of atypical (precarious) employment, i.e. they have even less protection in their jobs. On this background the article investigates whether there are other negative consequences from precarious employment, perhaps of a more lasting nature. Do temporary employees lack other fundamental rights and opportunities for job development that permanent employees have? To answer this question, the author utilizes a survey of app. 4,900 employees (response rate 57%), asking questions concerning rights and opportunities in the job, inter alia contribution to labour market pension, the sixth week of holiday (now quite prevalent in Denmark), employee development interviews and in-job training. The analyses (based on logit modelling, multivariate logistic regression) show that precarious employment (e.g. as a temp) is a risk condition, not only because of the stipulated end of the employment period, but also because it implies a clearly lower chance of obtaining a number of the rights and opportunities that are normally connected to an employment relationship. Thus, employer provision of contributions to a labour market pension is present only for 45% of precarious employees (against over 90% for permanent ones), and job development opportunities in the form of in-job training or courses are available for 40% of precarious employees (against 90% for permanent ones). The author concludes that there is a dearth of attention and information of the conditions of precarious employees and that both legal regulation and collective agreements should be adapted to improve the protection of precarious employees.