Antonio Aloisi, Valerio De Stefano, Six Silberman* In 2017, Sarah O’Connor of the Financial Times published a sensible plea, gently chiding both doomsayers warning of a “jobless society” and “techno-fantasists” paying breathless homage to a digital future filled with exciting new professions. “We should worry less about the jobs that might be going,” wrote O’Connor—due,…
Introduction Earlier this month, I presented a paper at the Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference at the University of Leeds, ‘On the Nature of Work and the Purpose of Labour Law’. A version of the paper as presented at the conference is available online here. In Part I of this two-part blog post, I concluded…
Introduction Earlier this month, I presented a paper at the Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference at the University of Leeds, ‘On the Nature of Work and the Purpose of Labour Law’. A version of the paper as presented at the conference is available online here. In this blog, I begin to summarise some of my…
The Federal Budget 2019 was formally released by the Federal Government last night (2 April 2019). However, in an election year, the Federal Government took the unusual path of confirming that the government would not be seeking to pass new legislation implementing that Budget in the remaining Parliamentary sitting days. Instead, the Budget legislation would…
As many readers would be aware, when the New Zealand Customs Act 2018 (Act) commenced on 10 October 2018, not all of its provisions come into force on the same day. I had been working with Custom Brokers & Freight Forwarders Federation of New Zealand (CBAFF) and other members of the Stakeholders Reference Group (Group) established by…
This is the third of three posts where I comment on Mexico’s “new” agricultural policy. For Part I click here, for Part II click here. In this post I discuss at length what might be the market effects of price support through the guaranteed prices program. A key factor as to whether guaranteed prices can substantially…
On 18 and 19 March 2019 the XVIIth annual Conference in Commemoration of Professor Marco Biagi took place in Modena, Italy. The conference is an interdisciplinary classic in the study of comparative labour law, labour markets and industrial relations. It is organized by the Marco Biagi Foundation at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia….
This is the second of three posts where I comment on Mexico’s “new” agricultural policy. For Part I click here. In the first post I have presented evidence that, in constant prices, the 2019 budget allocations to the “mainline” subsidy programs in agriculture are at historically low levels. [1] In particular, acreage-based payments (irrespective of production levels)…
Last week the Dutch government made international headlines with its share acquisition in Air France-KLM Holding (increasing its stake to 14%). According to the Dutch government the acquisition was justified to have a seat at the table when it comes to the role of the Netherlands (read Schiphol) as an aviation hub to protect the…
The debate on the future of work has largely concentrated how many jobs will be lost to automation and the number of workers who will likely be displaced. Since the publication of Frey and Osborne’s working paper in 2013, there has been a fury of policy and academic discussions on the issue, much of which…
The law of obligations and SMEs With its first released decision of 2019, the Ontario (Canada) Court of Appeal added itself to the growing list of Uber litigation Heller v Uber Technologies Inc 2019 ONCA 1. Most often, Uber drivers challenge their employment status. Largely, courts have found against Uber; drivers fall into some aspect…
Please find below the abstract of “Future Partnership in EU–UK Cross-Border Civil Judicial Cooperation” by Zheng Sophia Tang, published in European Foreign Affairs Review, Issue 4, Volume 23 (2018) edited by Jörg Monar and Nanette Neuwahl. In the past forty years, the EU has established a very successful and effective civil judicial cooperation scheme that…
Please find below the abstract of “The Criminal Provisions of German and UK Export Control and Sanctions Law” by Malte Wilke & Hinrich Rüping, published in Global Trade and Customs Journal, Issue 1, Volume 14 (2019) edited by Jeff Snyder. Germany and the UK have been among the strongest supporters of a liberal trade policy…
For a variety of reasons Australians have wholeheartedly embraced the various means of electronic communication and social media platforms. One lawyer’s brief history of the digital revolution In large part, technological progress has been benign, albeit confusing for certain generations. After all, when I first started in the law, our most sophisticated form of communication…
This is the first of three posts where I comment on Mexico’s “new” agricultural policy. In particular, in the first post I discuss how Mexico’s “mainline” subsidy programs have fared, in terms of funding, in the first year Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO, for his initials in Spanish) has been in power. In…
Beware those working in licensed premises – you can be liable for amounts equal to duty owing on goods stolen from those premises. Beware those working in licensed premises – you can be liable for amounts equal to duty owing on goods stolen from those premises. On 14 November 2018, following decisions of the Administrative…
In its first judgment regarding the European Commission’s recent fiscal State aid decisions, the EU General Court (GC) last week annulled the Commission’s decision of 11 January 2016 on Belgium’s so-called “excess profit rulings”. The exemption for “excess” profits The case concerns a specific provision in Belgian tax law, which provides for the possibility to…
AS THE confusion continues over whether the UK’s exit from the EU will be “hard”, “soft” or “just right”, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC)has announced certain goods entering Britain from the EU will be allowed through without checks or payment of duty for a temporary period. This approach is consistent with promises from the UK…
Introduction In June 2018, I presented a paper on ‘Trade in Services, Migration and Recognition of Professional Qualifications post-Brexit’ (draft available here) at the third Radboud Economic Law Conference, ‘Upgrading Trade and Services in EU and International Economic Law’. At the time, my interim conclusion (summarised in a blog post here) was that the ideal…
While the eventual outcome of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU remains uncertain, the text of the Withdrawal Agreement (WA) offers some insight into the likely approach of the EU to labour standards in any future EU-UK relationship. The WA was accompanied by a Political Declaration on the Future Relationship. In relation to social and…
