How human resource systems adjust to the shift towards contingent workers (EXCERPT), Monthly Labor Review Online, Mar. 1989

How human resource systems adjust to the shift towards contingent workers

Richard S. Belous

The human resource systems at many American corporations have experienced vast change in recent years because of increased competitive pressures. A key part of this change has been the dramatic growth of the "contingent" work force, which consists of workers who do not have a long-term attachment to their employers (for example, temporary, part-time, and subcontracted workers).

Corporations have responded to the competitive pressures by making employer-employee relations more flexible. In the 1980's, employers have generally used three methods to increase human resource flexibility. These shifts in employer behavior represent major institutional changes:

They altered compensation systems, tying wages and benefits more to corporate economic realities and less to customs and traditions.
They made the employment relationships more flexible and dependent upon corporate economic factors (a growing percentage of workers no longer remain with one employer).
They made long-term relationships with employees more flexible and based on corporate economic conditions by changing job ladders (career paths and structures), allowing flexible work assignments, more reassignments, and so forth.

This excerpt is from an article published in the March 1989 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.

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Related BLS programs
Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey

Related Monthly Labor Review articles
Contingent work: results from the second survey.—Nov. 1998.

Workers in alternative employment arrangements: a second look.—Nov. 1998.

Long-term consequences of nontraditional employment, The.—May 1998.

Flexible labor: restructuring the American work force.—Aug. 1997.

Into contingent and alternative employment: by choice.—Oct. 1996.

Reasons for the continuing growth of part-time employment.—Mar. 1991.

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