ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the labour market dynamics which are creating inequality, highlighting the connections between market-based competition, unemployment, non-standard work and low-paid jobs. It discusses the nature of inequality in the labour market in contemporary Australia, analysing how inequalities arising from the labour market affect the distribution of income across households. The chapter argues that further inequality of this kind is not necessary to reduce unemployment and that the current debate concerning wages and unemployment is misconceived in canvassing this agenda. The significance of non-standard employment for poverty and inequality is twofold. First, the precarious nature of the employment relationship erodes both full-year and life-time earnings potential. Second, the bargaining position of precarious workers is much weaker than of those employees working under standard employment relations. Transitional labour markets provide a policy framework which takes us beyond the impoverished visions of the future which bedevil the current debates.
