Department of Employment Essay

An increase in part time employment has been in the Retail and tertiary sectors. A survey carried out by the   suggested that 77% of workers in nightclubs, bars and public houses were part time workers, 65% of food retail workers were part time employees and 57% of restaurant workers were part time employees. The split between new full time jobs and part time jobs in the UK was 50.1% part time jobs and 49.9% full-time.  2(a) Identify the indicators normally used to distinguish between developing and developed countries and analyse their usefulness. In the world there are developed countries and developing countries and in order to distinguish the two indicators are used. Indicators such as GDP per head, life expectancy and birth rate are used to distinguish between the two types of countries.  GDP (Gross domestic product) per head shows the average income person and can be calculated quite easily. This can be used to compare the GDP per head of two countries; a developed country will have a higher GDP per head than a developing country. It used to indicate how goods and services they can consume and thus gives a gives a standard of living. GDP per head alone does not give a clear indication of the amount of goods and services an average person can consume. Therefore it can be adjusted to GDP per person in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) and this accounts for the cost of living. The PPP method takes the same amounts of goods and services in two countries and then calculates how much it would cost to buy these goods and services, i.e. a $100 in Ethiopia can buy more goods and services than a $100 in the United States, and without adjusting to PPP using GDP per head on its own to compare two countries would be unfair. GDP per head in PPP is a useful indicator of comparing two countries and especially in comparing a developed country to a developing country because it measures the average income per person and it is adjusted to its purchasing power, so if a person in country A gets $4 per hour and a person in country B gets $1 per however it does not necessarily mean that the person in country A can buy 4 times as much goods as the person in country B (given that they both work the same amount of hours). There are also weaknesses however in the GDP per head even when it is adjusted to PPP, it does not take in account the hidden economy. The hidden economy includes illegal activity, subsistence farming, and DIY etc. this would be particularly important in LEDC’s where there is a large rural economy and a great deal of corruption. For example it is thought if the hidden economy of Nigeria is brought forward in calculating its GDP then the GDP would increase by 70%. Another weakness is that although the GDP per head may be high it may mask a very wide distribution of wealth. In Saudi Arabia for example there are a very rich few the raise the GDP per head whereas the rest of the country are is not as economically well of as the GDP would suggest. Knowledge is also an indicator used to distinguish between developed and developing countries. Along with resources knowledge is need to make good use of the resources. Therefore education is a good indicator, this would include literacy rate and percentage of people going to higher education. In developed countries it is compulsory for children under the age of 16 to attend school, in developing countries however a percentage of the children start work before the age 16, as they need to help out with the family income. Children are seen as a source of income in poorer community of the LEDC’s and therefore are sent to work at an early age rather than attending school. This is particularly true in the rural areas of an LEDC. In developed countries there is no need for the children to work at such an early age as the parents usually work and can pay for their expenses or they can claim benefits from the government. The number of people that go on to university can be measured and in developed countries there are a greater number of people going to university than in developing countries. The graph (on the following page) compares the United Sates to Uzbekistan. It is quite clear that there are a greater number of university students in the United Sates than there are in Uzbekistan. Literacy rate is commonly used to compare to countries and does give a set of good results when comparing a developed country to a developing country. The number university student is not used as indicator but it is another example of how developed countries have more people going on to further education. Life expectancy and infant mortality are two important indicators between developed and developing countries. Life expectancy and infant mortality both show the state of the country’s health care. In developed countries the health care is quite good and people with an illness are likely to get a cure for their illness quickly and survive, but in developing countries there are poor health care systems and patients do not get treated as well or as quickly and as result there are deaths that could be prevented. A low infant mortality is the result of a good health care system and good health care systems are found in developed countries. For example in Bangladesh infant mortality is 69.98 per 1000 where as in Switzerland it is 4.87 per 1000. Life expectancy and infant mortality can be used to good effect to distinguish between developed and developing countries. The two indicators show the how much a government or the people of the country are willing to pay for their health care, the wealthier the country the better the health care, and wealthy countries are the developed countries. Life expectancy can, however, be very low, in Rwanda the life expectancy is 22, and this can give the impression that the country is the lowest of the developing countries. The low age of life expectancy is because of war and young men who are soldiers are the most likely to die and thus bring down the life expectancy. If there were no wars then life expectancy would be much higher and the country may not be seen as the â€Å"worst† of the developing countries.