Green, Francis; (2026) Hard at Work Job Quality, Wellbeing, and the Global Economy. [Book]. Oxford University Press

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Abstract

More than three billion people are hard at work across the globe. The contrast between good and bad jobs has huge implications for general wellbeing and health. Are the good ones expanding, or are bad jobs taking over? What, if any, are the signs of social progress in this part of our lives? Despite advancement over recent decades, there remain huge gaps in our understanding of trends in job quality worldwide. This book first develops a framework for understanding the relationship between job quality and wellbeing, based on the capability approach. It considers the evidence for this relationship across seven dimensions of job quality: earnings, job prospects, working time quality, autonomy and skill, the social environment, work intensity, and the physical environment. It is explicitly multidisciplinary, drawing on economics, industrial relations, sociology, psychology, and related areas. After reviewing the drivers of change, the book presents detailed new findings about country-level trends in job quality in much of the developed world. It examines both the average trends and changes in inequality and gender gaps. It finds that, with the exception of earnings, trends in job quality have little or no association with economic growth. Moreover, there is little or no within-country coherence among dimensions in how job quality has changed. The book supports the need for more data collection on job quality. It considers the future of jobs in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic and the AI revolution and reviews how much corporations, workers, and governments could make a difference.

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