“The only way to improve the economy is for Calvino and Diaz to understand each other.”

“The best way, the only way, is to improve the economy [Nadia] Calvin And [Yolanda] Diaz We understand each other. “Beyond the personal relationship that two Deputy Prime Ministers might have, this phrase summarizes the thesis defended in his new book, Professor of Labor Law at the University of Valencia. Adrian Todoli. employment “Labor organization and economic policy. How workers’ rights improve the economy” This Doctor of Laws and Economics degree examines the difficult and tortuous relationship between macroeconomic progress and labor rights. Two major issues in the progress of societies, and in recent years, have presented economic thought to the majority as difficult to concur, if not incompatible. A legend that Todoli tries to decipher in his book. “Labor rights improve the economy, by improving productivity and corporate competitiveness. In addition to reducing social inequality,” he says in a conversation with EL PERIÓDICO.

In 1989, with the USSR dying and neoliberalism well represented in the presidencies of Ronald Reagan, in the United States, and Margaret Thatcher, as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, the economist John Williamson penned “Washington consensus& rdquo;. This 10-point poem for deregulation marked the mood of international organizations like the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank and, according to Todoli’s reviews in his book, influenced economic debate until very recently. Since the 1990s, labor liberalization has prevailed, with the idea that it has hurt the economy rather than favored it. […] Criticism of this has been approached from a more ethical perspective, from a social justice perspective, rather than an economic one, he said.

After the 2008 crisis and the wave of protests that emerged in Europe during the Great Recession, the discourse of these institutions changed. “Excessive inequality does not promote sustainable growth.” He was accepted in 2015 as Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)International Monetary Fund) and today the supreme leader of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde. Also, those who are at the antithesis of their economic thinking, who already see this distribution of growth as a stimulus. “Raising wages is not only a measure of social protection, as indicated by the Bank of Spain, but lies in the firm conviction of economic efficiency; I defended the second vice-president, Yolanda Diaz, after the Cabinet approved the latest increase in the minimum wage for professionals.

To stop rising inequality

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“We’ve seen in recent years how inequalities have grown, but that hasn’t improved the economy. It has been income extraction, from workers to the company” says Todoli. His thesis fits, in this sense, with the recent publication of the French economist Thomas Piketty. Accordingly, 10% of the population in Spain owns 57% of the total wealth, while the 50% of those with lower incomes own only 7% of the wealth. The past 30 years, with the exception of specific deviations during bankruptcies and financial crises, have remained practically unchanged.

“There is a very clear ‘trade-off’ between economic growth and social rights. In Spain, for example, we have a turnover problem that is harmful to the economy, given that temporary worker It consumes less which harms the local economy and is less productive. We need state intervention to grow and ensure that we grow in a fair way.”