Employment, incomes and equality [antikvár]

PREFACE Unemployment has now become chronic and intractable in nearly every developing country. Whereas the industrial countries have mostly reduced open unemployment to about 3 to 6 per cent of their labour force, the comparable figure for other parts of the world is frequently over 10 per cent, and on top of this there are a range of other serious employment problems. Moreover, part of the difficulty is structural, in the sense that many of these employment problems will not be cured simply by accelerating the rate of growth. As the lessons of the 1960s accumulate, it is increasingly clear that these employment problems are closely related to inequalities in incomes and opportunities, which are not merely among their consequences but among their causes as well. It is in part the sharp and often growing contrasts between rural and urban living standards and opportunities, and within the urban income structure, which account for the rush of migration to the towns, the high aspirations among educated youth and the effort and sacrifice put into the search for a better-paid job. Thus social justice and a fair distribution of the benefits of growth are not only needed for their own sakes but have become conditions for eradicating unemployment. The ILO World Employment Programme was launched by the Director-General at the 1969 session of the International Labour Conference. As part of the Programme, pilot country missions were envisaged, to study, with the help of other agencies in the United Nations system, the causes of unemployment in countries with particular types of problems, and to bring out what needed to be done internationally as well as nationally. The reports of these missions have in fact several purposes, being intended not only to give the government concerned an analysis of its unemployment problem and a suggested programme of action, but also to provide guidance for the aid and trade policies of international organisations and of donor agencies, and to indicate priorities in research. XI