Chapter 24 - People at Work

Question 1

Work

Answer 1

Any activity that requires effort e.g. doing homework

Question 2

Employment

Answer 2

Work carried out in return for payment e.g. having a job at a supermarket

Question 3

Employees

Answer 3

People who work for others in return for payment

Question 4

Employers

Answer 4

People who hire others to work for them in return for payment

Question 5

Labour force

Answer 5

Consists of all the people who are available for work

Question 6

Who does the labour force not include

Answer 6

Retired
In school, college or a training course
Do not wish to work outside the home

Question 7

What are the three main areas of employment in Ireland?

Answer 7

Agricultural
Industrial
Services

Question 8

What people does the agricultural sector employ?

Answer 8

Includes all people employed in farming, forestry and fishing

Question 9

What employment sector has the fewest people employed in it?

Answer 9

Agriculture

Question 10

Why has the number of people employed in the agricultural sector fallen?

Answer 10

○New technology
○Young people not as interested
○Lot of agricultural produce is imported

Question 11

What people does the industrial sector employ?

Answer 11

Includes all people employed by firms who manufacture goods or are involved in building and construction

Question 12

What sector employs the most people in Ireland

Answer 12

Services

Question 13

What people does the services sector employ?

Answer 13

Includes all who work for firms and organisations providing services to the consumer e.g. finance, transport, gardaí etc and all those employed in the tourism industry e.g. hotel workers, car rental and air travel

Question 14

Unemployment

Answer 14

When people are willing and able to work but are unable to find a suitable job

Question 15

What help is offered to the unemployed?

Answer 15

○Jobseeker’s benefit
○Retraining programmes
○Back-to-work programmes
○Medical cards, fuel/food vouchers, rent supplements etc

Question 16

Give some reasons for unemployment

Answer 16

○Competition between firms
○New technology
○Recession

Question 17

What’s the difference between redundancy and being sacked?

Answer 17

When you are sacked it means you were unable to do your job or because of your bad behaviour. However, sometimes firms must let some staff go because there is no work for them to do. They are not bad at their job and they’re not being fired. It is called being made redundant

Question 18

What are the rights of an employee?

Answer 18

○Receive fair wage
○Given safe and healthy working conditions
○Join a trade union if they wish
○Receive correct number of days holiday
○Treated same as other employees

Question 19

What are the responsibilities of an employee?

Answer 19

○Should be honest and trustworthy
○Should do a fair day’s work
○Should be on time
○Should respect property of the employer

Question 20

Self-employed

Answer 20

People who work for themselves

Question 21

Why would somebody want to be self-employed?

Answer 21

►Want to be their own boss
►Want to become more successful than they can n their current job
►Want to make more money than possible in their current job
►They want to turn a hobby into a career
►May be unemployed and unable to find another job

Question 22

What are the rewards of being self-employed?

Answer 22

○Are your own boss
○Make all decisions
○Choose your own working hours
○Keep all profits

Question 23

What are the risks of being self-employed?

Answer 23

○Provide all the money needed to start the business
○Could loose money if things go wrong
○Might have long hours
○Responsible for all areas of the business

Question 24

What is the public sector? Give examples

Answer 24

Refers to all people employed by the state e.g. Civil servants, politicians, teachers, Gardaí etc

Question 25

What is the private sector?Give examples

Answer 25

Refers to all people not employed by the state e.g. Engineers, carpenters, plumbers, accountants, lawyers etc

Question 26

Organisation structure

Answer 26

Shows the position of each person in the business, from the owners right down to the most junior employees

Question 27

Supervisor

Answer 27

Person on the factory floor who is given responsibility to make sure others are carrying out their job properly

Question 28

Managing director

Answer 28

Most senior employee in the firm and is in charge of the day-to-day running of the bsuiness

Question 29

What are the main functions of the managing director/

Answer 29

• Run business each day
• Keep board of directors fully informed about what is happening in the firm
• Appoint other senior managers to run each department of the firm
• Make sure each department works together

Question 30

What are the main duties of the marketing manager?

Answer 30

• Responsible for running the marketing department
• Responsible fir all the firm’s advertising and sales promotion
• Tell human resources department what staff are needed in the marketing department and what qualifications they should have
• Keep within the budget set for the marketing department

Question 31

What are the main duties of the HR manager?

Answer 31

• Interview and recruit new staff
• Provide training courses for new and existing employees
• Make sure the workplace is safe and healthy
• Talk to trade union representative if there are problems in the workplace

Question 32

What are the main duties of the sales manager?

Answer 32

• Try to increase sales
• Employ and train sales people
• Keep in regular contact with the production manager so enough goods are produced to fill the orders made by sales department

Question 33

What are the different types of jobs in a firm?

Answer 33

Manual 
Clerical
Technical
Administrative
Services
Creative

Question 34

How may the skill levels of employees in the firm be divided?

Answer 34

Professional
Skilled
Semi-skilled
Unskilled