UN warns soaring inequality driving "populist" politics
UN warns soaring inequality driving "populist" politics
News brief - 14/02/20 View this email in your browser
UN warns soaring inequality driving "populist" politics
"Populism", a title often given to the political approach exemplified by Donald Trump and Boris Johnson, is being driven by soaring economic inequality. And in the face of contemporary challenges like climate change, technolgical advances, international migration and urbanisation the gap between rich and poor could get even wider.
This is the warning of the United Nations' Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) in its latest World Social Report 2020. The report also highlighted the role of trade unions in maintaining fair pay and recognised the difficulty faced by the labour movement in organising an inxreasingly precarious workforce.
But DESA told Member States that forthcoming challenges it calls "megatrends" - such as climate change and automation - can be turned into opportunities if nations act now to ensure the benefits of new technology and a green economy are shared more equally.
In our Manifesto for Labour Law, the IER recommends that both the workplace and economy are further demoratised to ensure all people in employment have a voice in how wealth is distributed and how challenges should be faced. This should be achieved through the establishment of a National Economic Forum on which key stakeholders - including trade unions - sit to scrutinise polilcy and plan for the future; Bargaining Councils at a sectoral level through which trade unions and employers can agree minimum terms and conditions for an entire industry; and stronger powers for trade unions at enterprise level to ensure individual employers are held to account.
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