Companies should be encouraged or even compelled to contribute to a "social economy" from their profits, a conference has been told.
The Conference of Religious of Ireland gathering in Dublin on "Social Partnership in a New Century" also heard speakers advocate tax relief for upper-income groups when they hire the long-term unemployed to perform personal services, such as childcare.
Mr Brendan Kennelly of NUI Galway and Mr Micheal Collins of the University of Limerick said successive national agreements had been successful in achieving real increases for workers in take-home pay, worth up to 22 per cent, between 1987 and 1997. They had also contributed significantly to reducing unemployment. But profits had grown even faster.
"The increase in living standards has led to a rapid expansion in the gratification economy without much reference to what, if any, social needs are being satisfied," they said in a paper on Social Exclusion and Social Partnership. They advocated "the development of the demand side for personal services . . . on a pilot basis."
"Personal services include childcare and care of the elderly as well as activities such as public safety, environmental protection and recreational activities. An important aspect of the markets for personal services is that they are relatively immune from competition from either machines or international trade."
Households hiring the long-term unemployed for such activities should receive tax relief.
The two economists also said voluntary and community bodies desperately needed seed capital. "One possibility is to encourage, or compel, private companies to make transfers to social economy projects. These transfers may be either financial or could take the form of lending human resources to social economy projects."
They said some companies were already doing this voluntarily.
In a paper, Towards a New Vision of Social Partnership, the joint directors of CORI's Justice Commission, Father Sean Healy and Sister Brigid Reynolds, said any successor to Partnership 2000 "should start with discussions aimed at getting agreement in principle on what proportions of expected growth should go towards particular areas, such as tax cuts, pay increases, infrastructural development and tackling social exclusion.
"This initial agreement in principle should be based on what is considered as fair and reasonable," they said. "Different groups would be free to trade a part of their allocation to gain some of another. For example, trade unions might trade part of the projected rise in pay for larger tax reductions, or employers might trade part of their projected corporate profits for greater expenditure on infrastructure."
They also endorsed the notion that socially useful work should be developed to meet important needs and help integrate the long-term unemployed into the workforce. They also questioned what they saw as the continuing priority given to economic over social objectives in successive national agreements.
This issue was also raised by the chief executive of the National Women's Council of Ireland, Ms Katherine E. Zappone, and its policy analyst, Ms Susan McNaughton, in their paper, Should We Stay at the Table (If There is One)? They said there was a "political-economic assumption that equality and social inclusion can be afforded only if Ireland's competitiveness increases".