A bit of thread creep, and I'll aid and abet that: sorry.
You say that many industries are employing the tactic of reducing T's & C's to remain competitive. You say it is becoming more common to work more for less reward; as customers to buy more for less. As we become used to that it can mean production being driven to LoCo countries as EU financial/social policies & associated costs drive prices too high and consumers will not spend. It will be self-defeating for national economies. Sadly, it will take a quite a long time before governments realise that their local workforce is not working and paying taxes and supporting the older generation. Driving production and services outside your own borders will have consequences in the long term. Capitalism and its demand for short term profit does not follow long term sensible government policy. They are acting in opposite directions.
So T's & C's in EU marketes are being allowed to drift lower yet the ECB says it is disturbed by present low inflation. It wants to increase it to 2% to help recovery and growth. So how does that model accommodate a lowering of incomes? Higher prices with less money to spend. Hm?
One way people can increase their life style is to have 2 wage earners and less children. That has been going on for many years now. A natural process of family financial management. I read that Italy is now in a critical low birthrate dilemma. They project forward a couple of generations and there will not enough wage earners to maintain the economy. No doubt the same could be happening under the radar in the other wealthy countries. So the short term profit gained by lowering T's & C's coupled with higher inflation and the consequent lower birthrate might have some distressing repercussions. Ours is but a very small cog in a very big wheel. That doesn't make it any less painful for our members.