Over-qualification of workers is an issue widely discussed in the literature. Contemporary phenomenon, it reflects the following concerns. On the economic front, over-qualification can be a waste of resources the company devotes to education, as well as under-use of the national productive capacity, since the skills of overqualified workers are not fully utilized. On a personal level, over-qualification can be a source of frustration and low motivation because it is often associated with lower wages and less use of skills learned at school. Organizationally, it can increase turnover, which generates costs in terms of hiring and training new employees. It can also lead to counterproductive behavior by overqualified workers, which penalizes organizations.  What about the situation in Quebec? Quebec performs well compared with other Canadian provinces. However, over-qualification rates observed are high and this concerns all actors in society. Therefore what can be done to mitigate the phenomenon of over-qualification and allow the Quebec economy to make the best use of its resources?  This article is based on a report entitled "The professional-qualification for graduates of colleges and universities: State of the situation in Quebec." Report has received financial support from the Commission of Labor Market Partners (CPMT) as part of a grant program to applied research (PSRA). There are different ways to measure over-qualification. We favored the approach called "objective", based on the skill levels that the National Occupational Classification (NOC) associated with each occupation and another, subjective, based on the assessment that are workers their position in relation to over-qualification. The data we used are obtained from censuses of 2001 and 2006, the National Household of 2011 and the National Graduates Survey Survey (NGS) conducted in 2013 among graduates of 2009 and 2010.  Here are the highlights and some policy recommendations that we believe are able to mitigate the phenomenon of over-qualification in Quebec. [googletranslate_en]

Based on the insights of more than 250 C-suite and senior level executives who attended The Future of Work: The Strategic HR Joint Council Meeting in May 2018, this report outlines the future of work and the evolutionary impact digital transformation is having, and will have, on business organizations from the perspective of HR executives. Among the insights: HR must learn to disrupt itself before it is disrupted, otherwise past success may become our failure. Many HR organizations are framing questions, challenges, and opportunities based on current paradigms and outdated business models instead of future paradigms and new ways of doing business.

Balancing long-term vision and short-term performance is the number one hallmark for future organizational success in 2025, CEOs say. The danger in a slowing economy is succumbing to the temptation to skimp on both time and resource investment in the digital future to boost short-term results, jeopardizing future competitiveness.

In the quest to maintain economic growth and ensure its benefits are widespread, can we find answers in arguments made in past decades?

The preparation of this document is part of the Digital Agenda in Education and Higher Education (PAN) that was unveiled May 30, 2018 and will end in 2023. The plan calls for a vision of integration efficient and optimal operation of the digital service for the success of all people, enabling them to develop and maintain their skills throughout their lives. The first measure of the PAN has a structuring in scope for the establishment and operationalization of a framework. This project aimed to design a framework of digital competence with inter-level range (from preschool to higher education, including general and vocational training). Thus, the reference framework for digital competence includes the dimensions considered essential to learn and grow in the 21st century, and for both learners and for faculty or professional staff. It should be noted that the specific aspects of the teaching practice will be treated in more detail in the professional skills of the teaching profession Repository. [googletranslate_en]

Recent policy discussion has highlighted the variety of ways in which the world of work is changing. One development prevalent in some countries has been an increase certain forms of non-standard work. Is this beneficial, representing increased flexibility in the workforce, or detrimental, representing a deterioration in job quality driven by automation, globalisation and the market power of large employers? These changes also raise crucial issues for tax systems. Differences in tax treatment across employment forms may create tax arbitrage opportunities. This paper investigates the potential for such opportunities for eight countries. It models the labour income taxation, inclusive of social contributions, of standard employees and then of self-employed workers (with applicable tax rules detailed in the paper’s annex). The aim is to understand whether countries’ tax systems treat different employment forms differently, before approaching the broader question of whether differential treatment has merit when evaluated against tax design principles.

We find that one third of Finnish employment is highly susceptible to computerization in the next decade or two. While this share is large, it is ten percentage points less than the corresponding share in the United States, which reflects cross-country differences in occupational structures. Low wage and low skill occupations appear more threatened. Service jobs are relatively more sheltered than manufacturing jobs. The estimated impacts do not necessarily imply future mass unemployment, since the approach employed does not take into account changes in the task content within occupations or the evolution in the mix of occupations. It also ignores powerful societal forces, such as prevailing regulation and established organizational structures, hindering technological advance. Despite these caveats, our findings suggest major future changes in Finnish employment.

In this paper, we highlight some issues related to the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on the future of work. First, we recognize the progress based on AI technologies and the anisotropy of the progress made in various areas of human activities. Driven by technological advances and massive investments, AI creates asymmetries that transform the labor market both in terms of content and in terms of geographical location. We examine the technological aspects in depth, because it often happens that the common perception of the AI ​​does not match the actual level of technical preparation. This is usually the case with any new technology. We dedicate a section to the analysis of the main limitations of the current IA, including the need for large amounts of data annotated and a massive computing power and the effort required to apply AI to each new problem or domain. We describe the potential of the technology of AI and its potential application areas (sometimes real), ranging from data analysis to robotics, through engineering, genetics, changes analysis climate, etc. Regarding the impact on the labor market, it is clear that the AI ​​is already bringing tangible benefits to certain companies and improves service levels for consumers. Furthermore, there is no single interpretation of how things will evolve. Predicting the spread of technology, and in particular its impact depends on a series of external factors, including new technological advances to overcome existing limitations, but also political and economic factors (regulation, availability of funds , cost / benefit aspects, etc.). Our analysis of the risks and benefits of AI for work and employment based on the assumption that, in most contexts, we must take into account the challenges of achieving genuine complementarity between man and machine through organizational choices and lifelong learning. [googletranslate_en]

This paper reviews trends and developments in both hours of work and the organization of working time (working time arrangements) and considers their implications for the future of work. Since the Industrial Revolution there has been a downward trend in hours of work (in those countries with longitudinal data on working hours), which moved in tandem with increases in wages and productivity – creating a virtuous cycle. In recent decades, however, this trend has ceased or even reversed in some cases. This has been accompanied by a bifurcation of working hours, with substantial portions of the global workforce working either excessively long hours (more than 48 hours per week), which particularly affects men, or short hours/part-time work (less than 35 hours per week), which predominantly impacts women. Regarding the organization of working time, there has been a diversification in working time arrangements, with a movement away from the standard workweek consisting of fixed working hours each day for a fixed number of days and towards various forms of “flexible” working time arrangements (e.g. new forms of shift work, hours averaging, flexi-time arrangements, compressed workweeks, on-call work) along with demands for extended and even 24/7 availability, with widely divergent effects depending on the specific arrangement. The other key emerging issue regarding the organization of working time concerns the impact of new information and communications technologies (New ICTs), such as smartphones and tablet computers, which enable constant connectivity. These New ICTs have resulted in a blurring of the boundaries between paid working time and both the times and spaces that are normally reserved for personal life. The paper raises a question as to whether, given the impacts of recent technological developments on employment, the resumption of the historical trend towards an overall reduction of working hours has become an economic and a social imperative. This would require public policies promoting the reduction of working hours, particularly for those workers working excessively long hours, as well as some basic guarantees regarding minimum working hours for those working in part-time jobs with very short hours. Such policies need to be combined with both policies and practical guidance regarding how to develop balanced working time arrangements that ensure minimum periods of rest, including paid leave, and can benefit both workers and enterprises.