The dominant labour contract that emerged with the development of capitalism has three basic characteristics: (a) a fixed wage payment per unit of time, for a ‘normal’ level of effort monitored

by the employer. Since most production activities stretch over time and require a prefixed flow of labour inputs, their undertaking on a recurrent or continuous basis requires a certain stability in the price of labour in terms of their input/ output mix; hence the orderly continuity of production is at odds with spot pricing of labour, and the wage is normally negotiated at intervals, with only quantities (i.e. employment) varying in between.