IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ozl/journl/v18y2015i2p205-237.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Isolating the Determinants of Temporary Agency Worker Use by Firms: An Analysis of Temporary Agency Workers in Australian Aged Care

Author

Listed:
  • Genevieve Knight

    (Flinders University)

  • Zhang Wei

    (Flinders University)

Abstract

Despite a reasonable amount of literature on firms’ reasons for using agency workers we contend that the firms which are users of agency workers are not well understood. Temporary agency work is interesting in the context of understanding the functioning of labour markets. Temporary agency work is of particular interest in Australia which already has a high level of casual employment offering employers considerable flexibility in managing their workforce by other means. We use a unique Australian employer survey in an industry with a higher than usual share of agency workers in the constrained worker supply context, to highlight and explore the differentiating features between those firms that do and do not use agency workers. The analysis enables better identification of the economic conditions under which firms use agency workers. We gain insight into aspects of the aged care sector that encourage temporary agency worker usage by firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Genevieve Knight & Zhang Wei, 2015. "Isolating the Determinants of Temporary Agency Worker Use by Firms: An Analysis of Temporary Agency Workers in Australian Aged Care," Australian Journal of Labour Economics (AJLE), Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre (BCEC), Curtin Business School, vol. 18(2), pages 205-237.
  • Handle: RePEc:ozl:journl:v:18:y:2015:i:2:p:205-237
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://ftprepec.drivehq.com/ozl/journl/downloads/AJLE182knight.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rodriguez, Eunice, 2002. "Marginal employment and health in Britain and Germany: does unstable employment predict health?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 55(6), pages 963-979, September.
    2. Susan N. Houseman, 2001. "Why Employers Use Flexible Staffing Arrangements: Evidence from an Establishment Survey," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 55(1), pages 149-170, October.
    3. Yukako Ono & Daniel Sullivan, 2013. "Manufacturing Plants' Use of Temporary Workers: An Analysis Using Census Microdata," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(2), pages 419-443, April.
    4. Edward P. Lazear, 1990. "Job Security Provisions and Employment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 105(3), pages 699-726.
    5. Levine, David I, 1991. "Just-Cause Employment Policies in the Presence of Worker Adverse Selection," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(3), pages 294-305, July.
    6. Brenda A. Lautsch, 2002. "Uncovering and Explaining Variance in the Features and Outcomes of Contingent Work," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 56(1), pages 23-43, October.
    7. Elizabeth George, 2003. "External Solutions and Internal Problems: The Effects of Employment Externalization on Internal Workers' Attitudes," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(4), pages 386-402, August.
    8. David H. Autor, 2003. "Outsourcing at Will: The Contribution of Unjust Dismissal Doctrine to the Growth of Employment Outsourcing," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 21(1), pages 1-42, January.
    9. Alex Bryson, 2013. "Do temporary agency workers affect workplace performance?," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 131-138, April.
    10. Chris Forde & Gary Slater, 2005. "Agency Working in Britain: Character, Consequences and Regulation," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 43(2), pages 249-271, June.
    11. Elke J. Jahn & Jan Bentzen, 2012. "What Drives the Demand for Temporary Agency Workers?," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 26(3), pages 341-355, September.
    12. Beckmann, Michael & Kuhn, Dieter, 2009. "Temporary agency work and firm performance : evidence from German establishment-level panel data," Working papers 2009/01, Faculty of Business and Economics - University of Basel.
    13. Abraham, Katharine G & Taylor, Susan K, 1996. "Firms' Use of Outside Contractors: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 14(3), pages 394-424, July.
    14. René Böheim & Mark P. Taylor, 2003. "Option Or Obligation? The Determinants Of Labour Supply Preferences In Britain," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 71(2), pages 113-131, March.
    15. Hajo Holst & Oliver Nachtwey & Klaus Doerre, 2010. "The Strategic Use of Temporary Agency Work – Functional Change of a Non-standard Form of Employment," International Journal of Action Research, Rainer Hampp Verlag, vol. 6(1), pages 108-138.
    16. Francesconi, Marco & L. Booth, Alison & Frank, Jeff, 2000. "Temporary jobs: who gets them, what are they worth, and do they lead anywhere?," ISER Working Paper Series 2000-13, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    17. John Purcell & Kate Purcell & Stephanie Tailby, 2004. "Temporary Work Agencies: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow?," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 42(4), pages 705-725, December.
    18. Garth Mangum & Donald Mayall & Kristin Nelson, 1985. "The Temporary Help Industry: A Response to the Dual Internal Labor Market," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 38(4), pages 599-611, July.
    19. Sebastian Nielen & Alexander Schiersch, 2014. "Temporary Agency Work and Firm Competitiveness: Evidence from German Manufacturing Firms," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(3), pages 365-393, July.
    20. Alfred Kleinknecht & Remco Oostendorp & Menno Pradhan & C. W. M. Naastepad, 2006. "Flexible Labour, Firm Performance and the Dutch Job Creation Miracle," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(2), pages 171-187.
    21. Connell, J & Burgess, J, 2002. "In search of flexibility: Implications for temporary agency workers and human resource management," Australian Bulletin of Labour, National Institute of Labour Studies, vol. 28(4), pages 272-283.
    22. Hakansson, Kristina & Isidorsson, Tommy & Kantelius, Hannes, 2013. "Stable Flexibility – Long-term Strategic Use of Temporary Agency Workers in Sweden," International Journal of Action Research, Rainer Hampp Verlag, vol. 9(3), pages 278-300.
    23. Robert Drago & Mark Wooden & David Black, 2009. "Who Wants and Gets Flexibility? Changing Work Hours Preferences and Life Events," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 62(3), pages 394-414, April.
    24. Commission, Productivity, 2011. "Caring for older Australians," Inquiry Reports, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia, number 53.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David A Brown & Nelson Ma & Jin Sug Yang & Nicole Sutton & Gillian McAllister & Deborah Parker & Olivia Rawlings-Way & Rachael L Lewis, 2023. "The impact of business model workforce configurations on value creation and value appropriation in the Australian aged care sector," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 48(3), pages 495-523, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alejandro Micco & Pablo Muñoz-Henríquez, 2018. "The Impact of Extended Employment Protection Laws on the Demand for Temporary Agency Workers," Working Papers wp463, University of Chile, Department of Economics.
    2. Baudy, Philipp & Cords, Dario, 2016. "Deregulation of temporary agency employment in a unionized economy: Does this really lead to a substitution of regular employment?," Hohenheim Discussion Papers in Business, Economics and Social Sciences 06-2016, University of Hohenheim, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences.
    3. Alexander Schiersch, 2015. "TFP, Labor Productivity and the (Un)observed Labor Input: Temporary Agency Work," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1532, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    4. Jennifer Ferreira, 2016. "The German temporary staffing industry: growth, development, scandal and resistance," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(2), pages 117-143, March.
    5. Schiersch, Alexander, 2016. "Considering the (Un)observed: temporary agency work in productivity estimations," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145749, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    6. René Böheim & Martina Zweimüller, 2009. "The employment of temporary agency workers in the UK – with or against the trade unions?," Economics working papers 2009-12, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    7. Adam Seth Litwin & Sherry M. Tanious, 2021. "Information Technology, Business Strategy and the Reassignment of Work from In‐House Employees to Agency Temps," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 59(3), pages 816-847, September.
    8. Matthew Dey & Susan Houseman & Anne Polivka, 2010. "What Do We Know About Contracting Out in the United States? Evidence from Household and Establishment Surveys," NBER Chapters, in: Labor in the New Economy, pages 267-304, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. John S. Heywood & W.S. Siebert & Xiangdong Wei, 2011. "Estimating the Use of Agency Workers: Can Family-Friendly Practices Reduce Their Use?," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(3), pages 535-564, July.
    10. Addison, John T. & Teixeira, Paulino & Grunau, Philipp & Bellmann, Lutz, 2018. "Worker Representation and Temporary Employment in Germany: The Deployment and Extent of Fixed-Term Contracts and Temporary Agency Work," IZA Discussion Papers 11378, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Peter Cappelli & J. R. Keller, 2012. "A Study of the Extent and Potential Causes of Alternative Employment Arrangements," NBER Working Papers 18376, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Domenico Lisi & Miguel A. Malo, 2017. "The impact of temporary employment on productivity [Auswirkungen befristeter Beschäftigung auf die Produktivität]," Journal for Labour Market Research, Springer;Institute for Employment Research/ Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), vol. 50(1), pages 91-112, August.
    13. René Böheim & Martina Zweimüller, 2013. "The Employment of Temporary Agency Workers in the UK : For or Against the Trade Unions?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 80(317), pages 65-95, January.
    14. David H. Autor, 2000. "Outsourcing at Will: Unjust Dismissal Doctrine and the Growth of Temporary Help Employment," NBER Working Papers 7557, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Linda McDowell & Adina Batnitzky & Sarah Dyer, 2008. "Internationalization and the Spaces of Temporary Labour: The Global Assembly of a Local Workforce," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 46(4), pages 750-770, December.
    16. Francesco Devicienti & Paolo Naticchioni & Andrea Ricci, 2015. "How Do Demand Volatility And Unions Affect Temporary Employment? A Firm-Level Approach," Working Papers 0415, CREI Università degli Studi Roma Tre, revised 2015.
    17. David H. Autor & William R. Kerr & Adriana D. Kugler, 2007. "Do Employment Protections Reduce Productivity? Evidence from U.S. States," NBER Working Papers 12860, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Alex Bryson, 2013. "Do temporary agency workers affect workplace performance?," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 131-138, April.
    19. Yukako Ono & Daniel Sullivan, 2013. "Manufacturing Plants' Use of Temporary Workers: An Analysis Using Census Microdata," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(2), pages 419-443, April.
    20. Beissinger, Thomas & Baudy, Philipp, 2015. "The impact of temporary agency work on trade union wage setting: A theoretical analysis," Hohenheim Discussion Papers in Business, Economics and Social Sciences 01-2015, University of Hohenheim, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Temporary agency workers; Labour demand; Forms of employment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • J23 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Demand
    • J40 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ozl:journl:v:18:y:2015:i:2:p:205-237. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sandie Rawnsley (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/becurau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.