L’intérim transfrontalier : les marges de l’emploi aux marges des territoires

The main contribution of the article is the light it sheds upon the socio-economic characteristics of this not very well-known but rapidly growing form of cross-border labor. The article shows how the development of such cross-border temp-work was enabled by three principle processes, the first being the particular geography of different economic and social developments on either side of the borders concerned. The second process involves the emergence of new practices among actors in labor-management. Finally, the third and final process revolves around the juridical normalizing of such practices through the definition of rules and bilateral agreements between the countries involved, who have chosen to privilege the free movement labor throughout the European member states. Having allowed for the draining of cross-border labor markets, temporary work agencies have come to play an important role as intermediaries in employment, serving as territorial managers of the labor-force. Indeed, they have become responsible the classic tasks of sorting and selecting cross-border laborers according to the quantitative and qualitative needs of the companies on either side of the borders, providing solutions for such classic human-resource management problems as labor shortages, employment flexibility, and pre-recruitment. In contexts where there is a shortage of qualified labor in certain jurisdictions (as in Luxembourg), and a surplus elsewhere (i.e. in Lorraine), these agencies effectively manage the regulation of the cross-border labor-market. Moreover, they also assume some very singular responsibilities, given the significant variations of social and fiscal legislation in the different countries involved. Indeed, they enable an effective management of labor-costs by way of the detachment of workers. Thus, companies retaining the services of temp-work agencies are able to benefit from significantly reduced salary overheads, making an opportunistic use of the detachment of cross-border temporary labor. The case of that person from the Lorraine who registers with a temp-work agency in Luxembourg only then to be sent off to work in his own state of Lorraine is a good example. Nevertheless, such practices of detachment are being increasingly better regulated in recent years, since the changes that were made to European regulations allowing for an improved coordination of social security systems ((CE) 883/2004).