HARVARD LAW SCHOOL'S WORKLIFEWIZARD TRIES TO BRIDGE THE GAP BETWEEN LABOR, BUSINESS AND THE ACADEMY

CAMBRIDGE, MA – Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program has partnered with the non-profit WageIndicator Foundation and the National Bureau of Economic Research to create the WorklifeWizard a web-based information resource and research tool focusing on worklife in the US.

Headed by Richard Freeman, Herbert Ascherman Professor of Economics at Harvard University, the aim of the WorklifeWizard is to become the major source of information on worklife issues in the US and to establish a cutting-edge survey research tool for business, labor unions, scholars, students, and others interested in the world of work.

"The WorklifeWizard seeks to be the best place for American employees to say how they’re doing, what they think about workplace issues, and to get the latest economic information on working in America,” Freeman said.

The WorklifeWizard also aims to become a resource for organized labor, especially in the high-tech science and engineering workforce.

"Our members (IBM employees) work in the information technology industry so they’re comfortable getting information from and participating in web sites like WorklifeWizard. The WorklifeWizard fits the bill for one-stop information on salaries, workplace issues and labor rights, as well as a survey that will be very useful for our Union," said Lee Conrad, National Organizer of Alliance@IBM, a division of the Communications Workers of America (CWA)

Given the versatility of the site’s Internet survey and the ability to quickly implement and gather data from survey questions, this new tool will also allow journalists, scholars and policymakers to quickly address some of the most pressing issues surrounding the American workplace.

“The WorklifeWizard promises to be a rich resource for researchers interested in developments in the U.S. workplace. The flexibility and potential reach of this web-based database makes it a unique and important new way to study the changing nature of work on an ongoing basis. I plan to use it extensively," said David Weil, Professor of Economics and Everett W. Lord Distinguished Scholar at Boston University’s School of Management

The WorklifeWizard Website

The site includes an Internet survey; an Information Center for employees; and a free salary checker.

The Internet survey elicits what employees think about many issues related to the world of work including: healthcare, job security, manager-employee relations, worker-customer relations and the impact of immigration on jobs in the US. Questions change as often as issues at work change. Researchers, graduate students and others will have the ability to add their own questions to the survey in the future.

The Information Center provides information on workers rights, labor and employment law, a worklife blog directory, major news feeds from many different sources, and a job tips section.

The salary checker will provide workers with information on pay according to their occupation, education, size of firm, experience, type of employment contract, and hours worked.

The WorklifeWizard is currently a partner with BusinessWeek, PhDs.org, Working America (AFL-CIO), the Communications Workers of America (CWA), and SmartEconomist.com.

The WageIndicator Foundation

WageIndicator is an organization based in the Netherlands and is supported by the European Union and the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The foundation is consists mostly of journalists and researchers from universities worldwide and collects information via an online survey, for the purpose of intra- and international comparisons of wages, working conditions, worker satisfaction, education and gender and race issues in the workplace. All WageIndicator sites have an online survey and a free salary checker.

The WageIndicator Foundation has similar websites that have become national worklife information sources in thirteen different languages. These websites are based in Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, China, Denmark, Spain, Finland, Germany, Hungary, India, Italy, Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, and the UK.

In the near future, WorklifeWizard partners will have the ability to perform comparative research with countries that are particularly relevant to the US economy: China, Mexico, India, Argentina and Brazil.