Reason, Contract, and Law in Labor Relations

How Does China’s New Labor Contract Law Affect Floating Workers?

After great national debate and controversy, in June 2007 China enacted a new Labor Contract Law that legally obligated firms to give workers written contracts as of January 2008. This paper uses survey data of migrant workers before and after the law to assess its effects on labor market outcomes. It finds that the new Law increased the percentage of workers with written contracts, raised soci...

Fault in Contract Law

A promisor is strictly liable for breaching a contract, according to the standard account. However, a negligence-based system of contract law can be given an economic interpretation, and this Article shows that such a system is in some respects more attractive than the strict-liability system. This may explain why, as a brief discussion of cases shows, negligence ideas continue to play a role i...

Uncertainty and Labor Contract Durations

This paper provides an empirical investigation into the relationship between ex ante U.S. labor contract durations and uncertainty over the period 1970 to 1995. We construct measures of inflation uncertainty as well as aggregate nominal and real uncertainty. The results not only corroborate previous findings of an inverse relationship between contract duration and inflation uncertainty, but als...

Individual Rights and Contract: (Freedom and Reciprocity in Contract Law)

Reshaping the social contract: emerging relations between the state and informal labor in India

As states grapple with the forces of liberalization and globalization, they are increasingly pulling back on earlier levels of welfare provision and rhetoric. This article examines how the eclipsing role of the state in labor protection has affected state–labor relations. In particular, it analyzes collective action strategies among India’s growing mass of informally employed workers, who do no...