15.3%: This is the proportion of employees who suffered at least one work-related accident in 2019 in the workforce of “order taking” companies. whose subcontracting accounts for more than half of turnover, according to the Ministry of Labor’s “Working Conditions and Psychosocial Risks” survey.

This proportion is just over 10% of all French employees. Based on available data and work published over the last decade, economists Corinne Perraudin and Nadine Thévenot highlight the hardship suffered by subcontractors working in already difficult sectors (industry, construction, transport). …).

The researchers are developing their central results in a contribution to the scientific communication project “What do we know about work?” by Interdisciplinary laboratory for public policy assessment (Liepp), distributed in collaboration with Presses de Sciences Po on the Jobs channel The side Lemonde.fr.

Unfortunately, these difficult working conditions and the resulting risks are rarely taken on by the contracting companies: this is precisely due to the definition of subcontracting, which creates an economic dependence between the companies, but without liability for the contract itself and without long-term commitment.

An ordering company simply commissions another company, the contractor, to carry out part of the production tasks. It is only jointly liable for the risks to which the subcontractor’s employees are exposed if they work on premises belonging to it. Since 2017, multinational companies have had a duty of vigilance regarding the risks to which workers are exposed throughout their production chain, in their subsidiaries in France and around the world. For all companies, however, this duty of vigilance boils down to the fight against hidden work.

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In 2019, 28% of businesses are subcontractors (and 7% take on more than half of their work). Some subcontractors are clients themselves. Subcontracting is not, strictly speaking, an employment status because workers are employees like everyone else. The authors’ work shows that these employees are paid less than the clients’ employees with the same qualifications and that they perform more jobs “Execution”. This means they are more often exposed to night work, handling heavy loads or even noise.

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