Restructuring in the public sector - CESI•Public sector workforce is ageing faster since the crisis •Public sector is increasingly feminised •While comparatively positive in

Coordinating the Network of EU Agencies 2015

John Hurley, Research Manager

CESI conference, Dublin

25 June 2015

29/06/2015 1

Restructuring in the public sector


• Eurofound

• What is the public sector?

• How has public sector employment changed after the crisis?

• With what quality of work changes is restructuring associated?

• Brief conclusions

Presentation


• A tripartite EU agency

• Established in 1975

• Comparative socio-economic research

• Budget of ca. € 21m

• 115 people in Dublin and Brussels combined

Eurofound


Working conditions

Living conditions

Industrial relations and

collective bargaining

Structural change and

restructuring

Areas of expertise


European Restructuring Monitor

www.eurofound.europa.eu/observatories/emcc/erm/annual-reports


What is public sector / service employment?

• “Services of general interest” • Functional definition: nature of the services provided. • Covers both market and non-market services which the public authorities class

as being of general interest and subject to specific public service obligations. CEEP’s approach in ‘mapping public services in Europe’ project. 29.5% of EU27 employment in 2010.

• Public ownership of the entity producing / providing service • Hard to operationalise

• Using NACE classification

• Easy to operationalise but an imprecise proxy of public sector employment

• Example: under the Irish public sector reform programme, public service headcount reduced from 320,000 to 290,000 between 2008-13. Over a similar period (2008Q2-2013Q2), health/education/public administration/social security headcount increased from 467,000 to 490,000.


Public sector employment: the main branches

Source: 5EWCS 2010

Survey question: “Are you working in the … public / private etc sector?” % of workers in public administration, education and health (NACE)


Public sector employment: by country grouping


Public sector employment: by country


Employment level 2002-13 , EU28 for main public service sectors

Source: EU-LFS. Note: data break in 2007/8 means categories are not exactly matching in two periods. Rescaled to 2007/8=100


2008Q2 2013Q2 chg 2008Q2 2013Q2 chg 2008Q2 2013Q2 chg

All sectors 44.7 45.7 1.1 25.4 29.3 3.9 4.4 3.8 -0.6

Public administration and defence etc 45.6 46.3 0.7 28.4 33.8 5.4 2.5 2.3 -0.1

Education 70.7 71.7 1.0 32.6 35.1 2.6 2.4 2.2 -0.2

Human health and social work activities 78.1 78.3 0.2 28.3 33.1 4.9 3.6 3.1 -0.5

2008Q2 2013Q2 chg 2008Q2 2013Q2 chg 2008Q2 2013Q2 chg

All sectors 14.2 13.5 -0.8 18.2 20.4 2.2 40.5 40.4 -0.1

Public administration and defence etc 11.7 10.8 -0.9 13.1 13.2 0.1 39.6 39.7 0.1

Education 17.2 17.1 -0.1 25.3 27.1 1.8 37.0 37.9 0.9

Human health and social work activities 14.2 13.4 -0.8 31.1 32.4 1.3 39.5 39.5 0.0

Gender - % of women Age - % of 50+

Turnover - % with tenure <

3mths

% temporary contracts % part time

Average actual weekly

hours

Public services: employment profile

Source: EU-LFS


In response to the fiscal crisis, to what extent has your organisation applied the following cutback measures?

%s are those answering 6 or 7 on a 1-7 likert scale where 1 is ‘not at all’ and 7 is ‘to a great extent’

Public sector retrenchment: unequally distributed

Source: COCOPs 2012-13


Performance improvement independent of reform intensity

Source: COCOPs 2012-13


During the last three years have the following changes occurred at your current work place which affected the immediate working environment? … Substantial restructuring or

reorganisation was carried out (% yes)

Public sector workers more likely to report restructuring

Source: 5EWCS 2010


Yes (%) No (%) OR Sig Yes (%) No (%) OR Sig

Work intensity 34.0 23.4 1.49 *** 46.6 38.3 1.39 ***

Work autonomy 54.4 51.8 0.98 NS 50.4 43.5 1.18 *

Teamwork 76.2 67.5 1.29 * 67.3 57.4 1.33 ***

Access to training 60.0 44.0 1.61 *** 44.3 25.7 1.71 ***

Computer use 61.4 42.8 1.76 *** 53.4 34.9 1.68 ***

Work subject to formal assessment 60.7 45.8 1.58 *** 52.6 30.8 1.91 ***

Psychosocial risk exposure 27.3 15.0 1.99 *** 13.4 10.3 1.33 ***

Physical risk exposure 32.9 26.0 1.46 *** 35.1 34.2 1.27 **

Bullying / harassment 9.5 3.5 2.74 *** 5.2 2.8 1.68 **

Any psychological health problems 64.9 56.9 1.57 *** 59.9 52.4 1.39 ***

Any physical health problems 64.1 57.1 1.46 *** 63.9 61.9 1.21 **

Stress 37.1 26.1 1.66 *** 32.1 23.5 1.49 ***

Job satisfaction 83.4 90.3 0.50 *** 82.3 85.1 0.69 ***

Good career advancement prospects 34.9 34.7 0.84 NS 36.3 24.8 1.28 **

Job security 77.6 82.8 0.63 *** 63.7 68.4 0.70 ***

Restructuring Restructuring

Work organisation

Health risks / outcomes

Work well-being

Theme Dependent variable

Public sector worker Private sector worker

Restructuring and associated quality of work dimensions

Source: 5EWCS 2010


• Restructuring increases reported work intensity, especially amongst public sector workers. • Exposure to psychosocial risks and negative associated health outcomes (fatigue, headache,

sleeping problems ..) are much more prevalent among public sector workers and in particular in restructured public sector workplaces.

• Access to paid-for training is more likely in public sector. One of the bigger positive effects of restructuring is that employees in restructured workplaces are much more likely to report having had access to paid-for training - in both public and private.

• Restructuring is associated with a much higher level of formal assessment of work, especially in the private sector. In fact, processes of change brought about by restructuring appear to lead to convergence on public sector norms of work performance monitoring.

Restructuring and associated quality of work dimensions (2)


Brief conclusions

• There are different public sectors. Core public sector is contracting. Employment is growing in health/education/social services … but the private share of employment is growing here too.

• Public sector workforce is ageing faster since the crisis • Public sector is increasingly feminised • While comparatively positive in many quality of work dimensions – working-time

flexibility, security – public sector losing some of its former attractiveness as an employer

• Restructuring as common in public as private sector.

• The conundrum: • E-government, MOOCs, telemedicine … but public service provision will

remain labour-intensive, there will be greater demand especially for health services, the services themselves will become relatively more expensive.

• Low-growth in developed economies, high levels of public debt post-crisis, pressure on public spending.


Thank you for your attention!

[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]


Public sector restructuring

• Contextual data from three sources

• EU-Labour Force survey • No public sector / private sector question. NACE sector classification • Data used to estimate shifting employment levels in predominantly

publicly funded sectors as well as ‘services of general interest’ • European Working Conditions survey (most recent wave, 2010)

• Includes public sector / private sector and restructuring questions • Data used to compare public and private sector workers on incidence

of restructuring as well as different quality of work dimensions • COCOPs survey of public sector executives 2012-13 (online; n=c. 8000, 16

European countries) • Data used to show how public sector reform has been implemented

across different countries. “Views and experiences of senior executives”.


Occupation (isco 2d) Sector (nace 2d) Quintile

Employment 2013q2 % chg % chg

Wage Educ (,000s) 2011-13 2008-10

Teaching professionals Education 4 5 9640 -0.2 3.1

Health professionals Human Health Activities 5 5 4773 3.7 6.9

Health associate professionals Human Health Activities 3 4 3579 -5.4 5.4

Business and administration associate profs

Public Administration and Defence etc 4 4 3023 -5.3 -2.0

Personal care workers Residential Care Activities 2 2 1905 3.7 19.2

Personal care workers Social Work Activities Without Accomm 1 2 1854 0.7 0.5

Protective services workers Public Administration and Defence etc 4 3 1808 0.7 0.7

Personal care workers Human Health Activities 2 3 1430 -1.3 -3.7

Personal care workers Education 2 3 1213 0.7 10.1

Business and administration profs

Public Administration and Defence etc 5 5 1199 1.9 7.0

Public services: top ten employing jobs



Public sector restructuring (PSR) practises

• Why is PSR different ? (Chp. 3 and 4)

• Different drivers • High employment security • High union density • The dual role of state • The wide range of interested parties (and its political dimension)

• How restructuring was carried out?

• Which tools in which countries? • Any representative data?

• OECD(2011) Mapping of restructuring instruments used in public sector • Structural & organisational reform • Budgetary instruments • HRM instruments

Documents

Restructuring in the public sector - CESI•Public sector workforce is ageing faster since the crisis •Public sector is increasingly feminised •While comparatively positive in