Labor courts play an important role in determining the effective level of labor market regulation in Germany, but their application of law may not be even-handed. Based on a theoretical model of the legal process and a new panel data set, we identify a nomination bias in labor court activity – that is, court activity varies systematically with the political leaning of the government that has ap...

This paper tries to understand the current status of South African labor market, which is changing in contradictory directions, i.e. a strengthening of the rights and protection of workers at the same time as the flexibilization of employment, in the context of the characteristics of labor and social security legislation in South Africa, as well as the nature of labor and social security reform...

Seeking the determinants of the lay-off process that takes place at the onset of Indonesian economic crisis in Java island, this study robustly shows that the lay-off rate, i.e., the ratio of number of lay-offs to the size of the labor force, is negatively related to the economic growth rate and share of labor in informal sector; and is positively related to the unemployment rate at the distric...

"The purpose of this article is to place Chinese labor migration from agriculture within the context of the literature on labor mobility in developing countries by comparing it to undocumented Mexican migration to the United States. The similarities fall within three general areas: the migration process, the economic and social position of migrants at their destination, and the agrarian structu...

Cervical ripening is necessary for successful delivery. Since cytokines are believed to be involved in this process, the aim of this study was to investigate possible changes in the mRNA and protein expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines (interleukin (IL)-1alpha, IL-1beta, IL-12, IL-18) and anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-4, IL-10, IL-13) in the human cervix during pregnancy, term and preterm...

BACKGROUND Preterm labor, failure to progress, and postpartum hemorrhage are the common causes of maternal and neonatal mortality or morbidity. All result from defects in the complex mechanisms controlling labor, which coordinate changes in the uterine fundus, lower segment, and cervix. We aimed to assess labor-associated gene expression profiles in these functionally distinct areas of the huma...

Despite popular belief, exercise while pregnant does not initiate labor, or preterm labor. Exercise is associated with delivering closer to the due date. Further, maternal exercise is associated with either no change, or shorter labor and delivery overall. Women who exercised had less complications during labor and delivery than those who did not exercise. More importantly, measures of the fetu...

Multinational companies and national governments pay considerable attention to labor cost and labor productivity differentials across countries. This paper analyzes total and unit labor differentials for a group of European and non-European countries in the 1960-1998 period. It deals with (i) the magnitude of total labor cost differences (ii) the developments in unit labor cost and labor produc...