Employment, Technology and Development

Employment, Technology and Development

Product ID: 8951

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Author: Amartya Sen
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Year: 2008
Language: English
Pages: 193
ISBN/UPC (if available): 0195651103

Description

This volume explores the interrelationships between institutions, technology and employment, and provides a conceptual framework for the use of existing technological knowledge as an employment strategy in developing countries.

This volume explores the interrelationship between institutions technology and employment. It provides a conceptual framework for the use of existing technological knowledge as an employment strategy in developing countries. In this context, Professor Sen stresses the importance of adequate institutional and incentives structures and pricing policies.

Two significant sets of guidelines emerge from the study. First, household production modes, prevalent in agriculture and services in less developed countries, have substantial implication for the utilization of technologies with domestic non-wage labor. Second, too much emphasis should not be placed on developing new intermediate technologies through research and development as the existing ‘technological shelf’ is available. A notable conclusion is that economic and employment policies, if formulate in isolation from the specific political, social and institutional milieu, are bound to flounder.

This study, conducted by Professor Sen for the ILO in the 1970s, emphasizes the use of social benefit-cost analysis as a tool to evaluate employment policies and optimal resource allocation in developing countries. Although largely analytical, it also deals with empirical problems of unemployment measurement in India.

This book will be of interest to general readers, and will specifically appeal to labor and development economists and policy-makers.

Contents

PART I: BASIC CONCEPTS
The Concept of Employment
Technology and Efficiency
Employment Modes and Not-wage Sectors

PART II: SOME MEASUREMENT PROBLEMS
Surplus Labor and Disguised Unemployment
Capital Intensity and Technology

PART III: INSTITUTIONS, TECHNOLOGY AND LABOR
Dual Labor Markets
Ownership, Classes and Allocation
Seasonal Variations and Employment

PART IV: POLICTY OBJECTIVES AND EMPLOYMENT
The Employment Objective
Employment in the Long Run

PART V: ECONOMIC EVALUATION
Shadow Prices and Resource Allocation
The Valuation of Labor
Concluding Remarks

Appendix A: On the Measurement of Unemployment in India
Appendix B: Public Schemes for Employment Expansion in India
Appendix C: Labor Cost, Scale, and Technology in Indian Agriculture
Appendix D: A Study of Tractorization in India

Bibliography
Index of names
Index of subjects