Labor legislation consists of statutes, regulations and jurisprudence governing the

relations between capital and labor, by providing for certain employment standards and a
legal framework for negotiating, adjusting and administering those standards and other
incidents of employment
Labor standards law is what sets out the least or basic terms, conditions and benefits of
employment that employers must provide or comply with and to which employees are
entitled as a matter of legal right.
Labor standards defined more specifically by jurisprudence, are the minimum
requirements prescribed by existing laws, rules and regulations relating to wages, hours
of work, cost-of-living allowance, and other monetary and welfare benefits, including
occupational, safety, and health standards.
Labor relations law defines the status, rights and duties, and the institutional mechanisms
that govern the individual and collective interactions of employers, employees or their
representatives.
Issues about employment tenure and termination fall in the area of labor relations.

In reality, labor relations and labor standards overlap. For instance, the grievance machinery (the
in-house method to resolve usually an employee's complaint) is a labor relations mechanism, but
very often the subject of the complaint is labor standards such as unpaid overtime work or a
disciplinary action. Figuratively, one may think of labor standards as the material or the
substance to be processed while labor relations is the mechanism that processes the substance.

"Labor," in ordinary signification, is understood as physical toil although it does not

necessarily exclude the application of skill, thus there is skilled and unskilled labor.
"Skill," by dictionary definition, is the familiar knowledge of any art or science, united
with readiness and dexterity in execution or performance or in the application of the art
or science to practical purposes.
"Work" is broader than "labor" as "work" covers all forms of physical or mental exertion,
or both combined, for the attainment of some object other than recreation or amusement
per se.
Worker" is broader than "employee," as "workers" may refer to self-employed people
and those working in the service and under the control of another, regardless of rank,
title, or nature of work.
Under Article 13 of the Labor Code, any member of the labor force, whether employed or
unemployed, is a "worker."'
"Employee" is a salaried person working for another who controls or supervises the
means, manner or method of doing the work.
Social legislation are those laws that provide particular kinds of protection or benefits to
society or segments thereof in furtherance of social justice.
Labor laws are necessarily social legislation.
 Agrarian reform law is a social legislation, so is the law providing for a social security
system. The Labor Code provisions on State Insurance Fund to cover work-related
injuries and occupational diseases are, likewise, pieces of social legislation.
If distinction must be stressed at all, it is simply in the sense that labor laws are social
legislation but not all social legislations are labor laws. In other words, in relation to each
other, social legislation as a concept is broader, labor laws narrower.
The aim and the reason and, therefore, the justification of labor laws is social justice.
Social justice, according to Dr. Jose P. Laurel in Calalang vs. Williams (70 Phil. 726
[1940]), is "neither communism, nor despotism, nor atomism nor anarchy, but the
humanization of laws and the equalization of social and economic forces by the State so
that justice in its rational and objectively secular conception may at least be
approximated. Social justice means the promotion of the welfare of all the people, the
adoption by the Government of measures
"The State affirms labor as a primary social economic force." Therefore, "it shall protect
the rights of workers and promote their welfare.
The 1987 Constitution declares as a state policy: 'The state affirms labor as a primary
social economic force. It shall protect the rights of workers and promote their welfare."
The basic rights of workers guaranteed by the Constitution are: the rights to organize
themselves; to conduct collective bargaining or negotiation with management; to engage
in peaceful concerted activities, including to strike in accordance with law; to enjoy
security of tenure; to work under humane conditions; to receive a living wage; and to
participate in policy and decision-making processes affecting their rights and benefits as
may be provided by law.
A constitutional commissioner has characterized the 1987 Constitution as "especially pro-
labor," for the rights of workers and employees have acquired new dimensions while
some concepts have been constitutionalized.
Basis/foundation of labor laws: Police Power of the State