Employment
For the Kaiser Chiefs album, see Employment (album)Employment is a
contract between two parties, one being the
employer and the other being the
employee. In a commercial setting, the employer conceives of a productive activity, generally with the intention of creating
profits, and the employee contributes
labour to the
enterprise, usually in return for payment of
wages.
Employment also exists in the
public,
non-profit and household sectors.
In the
United States, the "standard"
employment contract is considered to be
at-will meaning that the employer and employee are both free to terminate the employment at any time and for any cause, or for no cause at all.
To the extent that employment or the
economic equivalent is not universal,
unemployment exists.
Employment is almost universal in
capitalist societies. Opponents of capitalism such as
Marxists oppose the capitalist employment system, considering it to be unfair that the people who contribute the majority of work to an organization do not receive a proportionate share of the profit. However, the
surrealist and the
situationist movements were among the few groups to actually
oppose work, and during the partially surrealist-influenced events of
May 1968 the walls of the
Sorbonne were covered with anti-work graffiti.
Labourers often talk of "getting a job", or "having a job". This
conceptual metaphor of a "job" as a possession has led to its use in slogans such as "money for jobs, not bombs". Similar conceptions are that of "land" as a possession (
real estate) or
intellectual rights as a possession (
intellectual property). The
Online Etymology Dictionary explains that the origin of "job" is from the obsolete phrase "jobbe of work" in the sense of "piece of work", and most dictionaries list the Middle English "gobbe" meaning "lump" (gob) as the origin of "jobbe". Attempts to link the word to the biblical character
Job seem to be
folk etymology.
An employer is a person or institution that hires employees or workers. Employers offer
wages to the workers in exchange for the worker's
labor power.
Employers include everything from individuals hiring a
babysitter to
governments and
businesses which may hire many thousands of employees. In most western societies governments are the largest single employers, but most of the work force is employed in small and medium businesses in the
private sector.
Note that although employees may contribute to the evolution of an enterprise, the employer maintains autonomous control over the productive base of
land and
capital, and is the entity named in
contracts. The employer typically also maintains ownership of
intellectual property created by an employee within the scope of employment and as a function thereof. These are known as "
works for hire".
Within large organizations the management of employees is often handled by
Human Resources departments. On the national scale employers can be organized in
employers' organizations.
An employee contributes labor and expertise to an endeavour. Employees perform the discrete activity of economic production. Of the three
factors of production, employees usually provide the
labor.
Specifically, an
employee is any person hired by an employer to do a specific "
job". In most modern economies the term employee refers to a specific defined relationship between an individual and a corporation, which differs from those of
customer, or
client. Most individuals attain the status of employee after a thorough process of interviews with several departments within a company. If the individual is determined to be a satisfactory fit for the position, he is given an official offer of employment within that company for a defined starting salary and position. This individual then has all the rights and privileges of an employee, which may include medical benefits and vacation days. The relationship between a corporation and its employees is usually handled through the
human resources department, which handles the incorporation of
new hires, and the disbursement of any benefits which the employee may be entitled, or any grievances that employee may have. An offer of employment, however, does not guarantee employment for any length of time and each party may terminate the relationship at any time. This is referred to as
at will employment. While the terms
accountant,
lawyer and
photographer might refer to professions, they are not
employee titles, which may include
Senior Developer,
Executive Assistant, or
Regional Sales Manager and the like.
There are differing classifications of workers within a company. Some are
full-time and permanent and receive a guaranteed
salary, while others are hired for short term contracts or work as temps or
consultants. These latter differ from permanent employees in that the company where they work is not their employer, but they may work through a temp-agency or consulting firm. In this respect, it is important to distinguish
independent contractors from employees, since the two are treated differently both in
law and in most
taxation systems.
Some companies feel that a happier work force is a better one and thus offer extra benefits to improve team spirit and performance. However, other employers try to increase profits by giving low wages and few benefits. To resist this, employees can organize into
labor unions (
American English), or
trade unions (
British English), who represent most of the available work force and must therefore be listened to by the management. This can lead to considerable ill-will and sometimes even
violence between the two sides, but it can also lead to a peaceful and prosperous society, especially in countries in which the government plays an active mediator role in
collective bargaining. This has helped produce prosperous economies in many countries due to the employees' increased spending power. Collective bargaining has in addition proved to be a powerful
conflict resolution tool that has also enabled
social dialog.
Associate is a term used by some companies instead of
employee.
Big box retailers like
Wal-Mart and
Home Depot, for example, use this term for non-
management employees. Other firms use terms such as
teammate or
team member instead of
employee.
Many companies further classify employees as
exempt or
non-exempt. This designation is used to separate employees that are eligible for overtime from those that are not. An
exempt employee is one that is typically salaried and is not eligible to earn overtime.
Non-exempt employees are typically paid hourly and are eligible for overtime pay.
When an individual entirely owns the business for which he or she labours, this is known as
self-employment. If a self-employed individual has only one client for whom he or she performs work, he or she may be considered an employee of that client for tax purposes. Self-employment often leads to
incorporation. Incorporation offers certain protections of one's personal assets. Laws of incorporation vary from state to state with California having the most incorporated businesses of any state in the U.S.
Workers who are not paid wages, such as
volunteers, are generally not considered as being employed.
Someone who works under obligation for the purpose of fulfilling a debt without pay is known as a
slave and slaveowners are also not considered employers. Some historians suggest that slavery is older than employment, but both arrangements have existed for all recorded history.
*
Cornell University's
School of Industrial and Labor Relations*
Labor and Worklife Program at
Harvard Law SchoolDeath on the Job, Filmmakers: William Guttentag and Vince DiPersio,1991
Office Space, written and directed by Mike Judge.
*
Equal Opportunity Employment *
Dangerous jobs*
Colin Clark's Sector Model
*
Job analysis*
Job matching*
Labour (economics)*
Labour market*
Labour power*
Occupation and employment's effect on identity*
Personnel selection*
Reserve army of labour*
Wage labour*
Job Websites*
Labor & Worklife Program Harvard Law School*
NBER, Science and Engineering Workforce Project*
Comprehensive overview of employment law and best practice for the United Kingdom*
United States Department of Labor report on the current employment situation
