ABSTRACT
Three overarching themes characterize the debate over international compensation systems in Europe, the USA and Japan (Sparrow, 2004). First, there is a shift from job-to person-based human resources systems, a trend that breaks the historically comparative patterns of wage structure. Second, there is a process of transferring social costs and risks away from organizations and the state to the individual. Third, there are significant threats to the psychological contract and a fragmentation and individualization of the reward-effort bargain.
