ABSTRACT
Job security provisions raise dismissal costs and slow the adjustment of employment to changes in demand, but employment protections also lessen resistance to technological and organizational change and motivate workers to learn specific skills. This chapter discusses the possibilities of work sharing, both as an alternative to temporary layoffs and as a general strategy for combating unemployment. A growing number of collective-bargaining agreements included job security provisions, and in 1988 Congress passed the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act. Short-time work stabilizes employment within the firm by providing an alternative to temporary layoffs, and it extends the period over which permanent work force reductions take place, allowing time for attrition to minimize the impact of displacement. The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 was another successful work sharing initiative. It limited the standard work week to forty hours and required time-and-a-half payment for overtime.
