GENERAL PROVISIONS ARTS.

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and work hours, wage and wage protection, validity of dismissal as well as the
processes of unionization and collective bargaining. Those substantive rights
are enforceable through procedures prescribed in the Code, devised by either
the parties themselves or the government in its role as regulator of employment
relations.
The Labor Code is not one-sided. It is not meant to protect a sector to
oppress another. All throughout the Code, the rights and responsibilities not
only of employees but also of employers are recognized. Indeed, the Labor Code
has to protect the interests of both employees and employers, for if it does not,
it would be unconstitutional. The very first article of the Constitution’s Bill of
Rights refers to all persons — rich or poor, aliens or citizens, artificial or natural
— when it states: “No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without
due process of law, nor shall any person be denied the equal protection of the
laws.” It is unjustified to view the Labor Code as a law of and for workers only, if
this term refers only to hired workers.
“Labor” in “Labor Code” is better viewed in its broad ordinary sense as work
and work relationship, referring to any economically productive application of
physical, mental and material resources. In this sense, the term “labor” simply
means work and does not exclude the work of business owners and managers.
Labor Code articles repeatedly show the interplay of owners of mental, physical
and material resources. Their interdependence permeates the Code.1
Thus, the Labor Code speaks of myriad concepts such as employment
relationship, collective bargaining, and employment termination. Even only on
these three matters, it is obvious that the employee is not alone — he is employed
by and he bargains with another. That other is the employer. The Labor Code
will become unintelligible if it is concerned only with the needs and rights of
employees as if there were no employers. Indeed, as Harvard’s John Dunlop
confirms, in any industrial relations system there are three actors: the employers,

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As Gill of Harvard asserts: “Economic development is not a mechanical process;
it is not a simple adding up of assorted factors. Ultimately, it is a human enterprise.
And like all human enterprises, its outcome will depend finally on the skill, quality,
and attitudes of the men who undertake it… There must be what economists call
entrepreneurs: men who possess the drive, ambition, foresight, and imagination to
break through traditional barriers, overcome social inertia, and transform theory
into practice… Capital accumulation is indispensable for expanding production
and providing employment for the growing labor force.” (Richard T. Gill, Economic
Development, [Prentice-Hall, 1963], pp. 12 and 19). Conformably, Sharp, et al., in their
very successful book, affirm that “all goods and services that make up an economy’s
real GDP are produced from labor and capital resources. Without labor and capital,
production could not take place.” (Ansel M. Sharp, Charles A. Register, and Paul W.
Grimes, Economics of Social Issues [McGraw-Hill, 2006, 17th Edition], p. 359)

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