DO CITIZENS HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE BETWEEN EMPLOYMENT OR NON-EMPLOYMENT?

Do citizens have the right to choose between employment or non-employment?

Employment or Non-Employment

Introduction

Fundamental to an effectively functioning democracy are citizens who are able to make sophisticated decisions. The presumption of a politically knowledgeable and capable populous underlies much normative political theory. It is central to assuring that authority is legitimate and that it represents the will of the people. To exercise rights and responsibilities, people must understand the characteristics of those rights and responsibilities. To effectively choose leaders, publics must comprehend the programs that leaders propose. Democratic practice requires an 'informed' citizenry. (Khattab, 2009)

Do citizens have the right to choose between employment or non-employment?

To be 'informed' citizens need to have certain access to pertinent information. Modern democracies invest significant resources into ensuring that this information is available. In activities as diverse as being cautioned by the police (one of the most direct methods) to mass media based public information campaigns (as one of the most indirect), there are many ways that citizens can be guided, instructed and given pertinent knowledge. This is true in regulating individual behaviour and in attempts to change it, governments utilize many different techniques to keep citizens 'informed'. (Khattab, 2009)

The Advantages to the Individual/State of Employment

Public sector employment involves working for the government at a state or local government level. Private sector jobs are traditionally considered to offer better compensation and benefits than government jobs, but that's not necessarily the case. State and government jobs may not be able to compete with the financial bonuses private sector employees enjoy, but they offer immense job security and tax-free benefits. Public sector employees also have the advantage of collective bargaining for benefits through their respective labor and employee unions. State and government employees enjoy many other advantages and benefits.

State and government employees are generally paid better than people doing the same in the private sector. For instance, transit bus drivers and USPS employees are better paid then private bus drivers and employs of private postal companies, respectively. Public sector employees also get better salary increases than their private sector counterparts because these increments are not related to performance but instead depend on the duration of employment. As long as a public sector employee meets the minimum requirements, he will get a sizable increment every year.

Types of Non-Employment

Though there have been several definitions of voluntary and involuntary unemployment in the economics literature, a simple distinction is often applied. Voluntary unemployment is attributed to the individual's decisions, whereas involuntary unemployment exists because of the socio-economic environment (including the market structure, government intervention, and the level of aggregate demand) in which individuals operate. In these terms, much or most of frictional unemployment is voluntary, since it reflects individual search behavior. On the other hand, cyclical unemployment, structural unemployment, and classical unemployment, are largely involuntary in nature. However, the existence of structural unemployment may reflect choices made by the unemployed in the past, while classical unemployment may result from the legislative and ...