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Using recent survey data, this paper examines the career satisfaction of white/Caucasian and visible minority managerial, professional and executive employees in the information and communications technology and financial services sectors in corporate Canada. Black, South Asian and Chinese employees were less satisfied with their careers than white/Caucasian employees, but to varying magnitudes--with Black employees being the least satisfied. About 58% to 82% of the differences in career satisfaction scores, depending on the particular ethnic group, can be accounted for by factors included in this paper. Of the unexplained portion, most of the differences in career satisfaction between white/Caucasian and minority groups are attributable to higher returns to white/Caucasian employees' human capital and demographic characteristics.

This study uses human capital and gender stratification theory to answer three research questions concerning the gendered patterns of precarious employment the effects of human capital investments and family obligations on precarious employment, and the extent that these investments and obligations affect precarious employment differently for men and women. Lucrative jobs that offer benefits, union protection, with full-time work status were considered indicators of high quality and therefore non-precarious employment. Using data from U.S. respondents, findings suggest: a) a "gender" to precarious employment in that women are more likely to work in low quality job settings; b) gender discrepancies in benefits and union protection are explained by differences in men's and women's human capital, family investments, and other work-related situations; and, c) gender differences in wages and part- time work status result from workplace discrimination towards women. The implications of these findings are discussed along with recommendations for future research.

The article reviews four books: "Racialized Migrant Women in Canada: Essays on Health, Violence, and Equity," edited by Vijay Agnew; "Fight Back: Workplace Justice for Immigrants" by Aziz Choudry, Jill Hanley, Steve Jordan, Eric Shragge, and Martha Stiegman; "Real Nurses and Others: Racism in Nursing" by Tania Das Gupta; and one other.

The article reviews the book, "Labour Pains: Thunder Bay's Working Class in Canada's Wheat Boom Era," by Jean Morrison.

This paper examines the availability of employer offered childcare and eldercare support in Canada. In addition, the associations between these support programs, gender and voluntary and involuntary part-time work are also examined. Using Statistics Canada's 2003 Workplace and Employee Survey, results show that employer offered childcare programs exist in a very small number of workplaces, and eldercare support programs are almost nonexistent. Moreover, women are less likely than men to be offered family support programs. Voluntary and involuntary part-time workers are less likely to be offered family support programs than full-time workers. We argue that if individuals are going to receive assistance for childcare and eldercare, that assistance is more likely going to come from the government as opposed to employers. We suggest publicly funded universal family support programs to assist workers.

The conflict between property rights and the right of association creates the case for various policy avenues to ensure that employees have effective access to the right to associate for the purposes of collective bargaining. One such labour policy in Canada is first-contract arbitration. The experience of this policy in Quebec over the last three decades has achieved key objectives: ensuring first agreements for newly unionized workers, developing constructive bargaining relationships and overcoming what can be a major obstacle to an effective right to associate. After reviewing this experience, this article provides an overview of the unionization campaigns resulting in union certifications for the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada in six Wal-Mart facilities in Quebec province over the last six years. It then examines two recent cases of first-contract arbitration for these certifications. In one case, the company summarily closed the department concerned after the first contract was awarded. In the second case, the store remains open, with an operative collective agreement. Absent a policy of first-contract arbitration, it appears unlikely that this would be the case. The evolution of the bargaining relationship beyond the first-contract will provide a key test of the relative efficacy of Canadian policy approaches to ensure the freedom of association.

"An Empirical Assessment of the Employee Free Choice Act: The Economic Implications by Ann Layne-Farrar provides empirical evidence concerning the impact on the U.S. unemployment rate and employment-to-population ratio should the highly controversial Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) become law. The paper has received widespread public attention and its analysis is being used in the debate surrounding the EFCA. This commentary raises three important questions about the empirical analysis: Are the predictions presented in the study, concerning the effects of the EFCA, realistic? Is the research design likely to identify the effects of the EFCA? Why do the data used in the analysis cover such a short time period? The discussion suggests the empirical results presented in Layne-Farrar (2009) should be viewed with considerable skepticism.

Addresses the growing inequality, decline of unions, and stagnant labour laws in Canada.

The conflict between property rights and the right of association creates the case for various policy avenues to ensure that employees have effective access to the right to associate for the purposes of collective bargaining. One such labour policy in Canada is first-contract arbitration. The experience of this policy in Quebec over the last three decades has achieved key objectives: ensuring first agreements for newly unionized workers, developing constructive bargaining relationships and overcoming what can be a major obstacle to an effective right to associate. After reviewing this experience, this article provides an overview of the unionization campaigns resulting in union certifications for the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada in six Wal-Mart facilities in Quebec province over the last six years. It then examines two recent cases of first-contract arbitration for these certifications. In one case, the company summarily closed the department concerned after the first contract was awarded. In the second case, the store remains open, with an operative collective agreement. Absent a policy of first-contract arbitration, it appears unlikely that this would be the case. The evolution of the bargaining relationship beyond the first-contract will provide a key test of the relative efficacy of Canadian policy approaches to ensure the freedom of association.

American labour law is broken. As many as 60 percent of American workers would like to have a union, yet only 12 percent actually do. This is largely due to systematic employer interference, often in violation of existing laws. The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), currently before Congress, contains provisions to rectify this problem. Canada's experience with similar provisions can be helpful in evaluating the arguments surrounding this act. It suggests that the reforms proposed in EFCA can be expected to safeguard rather than deny employees' free choices. They will not alter the balance of power in collective bargaining, but only help to ensure that workers can exercise their basic right to meaningful representation at work and, potentially, to win gains that could help to reduce inequality and return America to prosperity.

The authors are engaged in a multi-dimensional project that analyzes Canadian private sector experience under provincial and federal labour statutes. The broad objective of the research is to draw nuanced lessons from the Canadian experience that will inform the debate over labour law reform in the U.S. This commentary reflects the authors´ preliminary research results as they relate to the specific proposals included in the Employee Free Choice Act.

[This] is an annotated list of selected recent publications on unionization and labour market performance, with relevance to Canada-U.S. labour market comparisons and the effect of collective bargaining structures on economic and social outcomes. While the broad literature on this topic is vast, the publications summarized below seem to be germane to Canadian aspects of the U.S. Employee Free Choice Act debate that are considered in this special issue of Just Labour. --Introduction

In the wake of a series of prolabor Supreme Court decisions in Canada, the mantra of “workers' rights as human rights” has gained unprecedented attention in the Canadian labor movement. This article briefly reviews the Canadian labor movement's recent history with the Supreme Court before arguing that elite-driven judicial strategies, advocated by several academics and Canadian unions, threaten, over time, to depoliticize traditional class-based approaches to advancing workers' rights. The argument is premised on the notion that liberal human rights discourse does little to address the inequalities in wealth and power that polarize Canadian society along class lines.

English/French abstracts of articles in the Spring 2009 issue.

English/French abstracts of the articles in the Fall 2009 issue.