Bargaining Structure Research Articles

Union Strategies to Re-Regulate Working Time

The organization of working time is a central concern in today's labour market, as it is connected to experiences of work-life conflict, employment insecurity, and broader patterns of gender inequality. This article examines union responses to working time changes using a case study of four large unions, as well as a larger survey of working time provisions in major collective agreements. The article contends that working time re-regulation strategies include not only efforts to reduce hours of work, but also a range of strategies to promote 'employee-oriented time flexibility.' These working time strategies provide some means to address growing forms of work-life conflict and working time inequalities; however, these strategies are constrained by a number of factors, including employer resistance and the need for broader-based representational and collective bargaining structures.

Interest representation between social partnership and solidarity

This article examines how unions can represent workers in a labour market that is increasingly divided into insiders and outsiders. The first part of the article focuses on prospects for solidarity in the context of current bargaining structures and considers new forms of regulation that allow for more universal forms of wage protection, including a European minimum wage. The second part of the article discusses the introduction of new negotiation practices that allow - through social partnership - for employee representation and protection at the workplace.

Collective Bargaining Structure and its Determinants: An Empirical Analysis with British and German Establishment Data

Both Britain and Germany have experienced a substantial decline in collective bargaining coverage in recent decades, though coverage is lower in Britain. Whereas multi-employer bargaining predominates in Germany, single-employer bargaining is more important in Britain. Econometric analyses show that similar variables play a statistically significant role in explaining the structure of collective bargaining in both countries; these include establishment size and age, foreign ownership, public sector affiliation and subsidiary status.

Collective Bargaining and Social Pacts: Greece in Comparative Perspective

What are the institutional prerequisites for the creation and maintenance of centralized collective bargaining and social pacts? This article compares Greek experience since 1990 with that in other countries, arguing that societies are likely to diverge on how they respond to the issues of changing bargaining structure and tripartite policy-making. While neo-institutionalist approaches, and particularly their ‘varieties of capitalism’ variant, can go a long way in interpreting these diverse responses, they have problems accounting for institutional change. To accomplish this we need a more dynamic understanding of how past institutional arrangements in combination with current tensions over particular issues, and the costs and opportunities presented to actors, give rise to distinctive responses.

Productivity, indexation and macroeconomic outcomes: The implications of goods market competition and wage bargaining structure

One strand of the macroeconomics literature explores the extent to which the indexation of nominal wages to a variable in addition to the price level can improve macroeconomic performance. The present paper contributes to this literature by developing a model in which the nominal wage is indexed not only to the price level but also to productivity. Two key features of the framework are a monopolistically competitive goods market and a unionized labor market in which wages are determined by a finite number of unions. A significant finding is that the multiparameter indexation scheme generally outperforms full-information wage setting.

Centralization of Bargaining and Wage Inequality: A Correction of Wallerstein

Wage inequality is a subject of intense political and substantive concern, and differencesin the extent of wage inequality between the Anglo-American economies and those of con-tinental Europe animate public and scholarly discussion. The wide earnings differentialsobserved in the United States and the United Kingdom are commonly justified as the properand necessary incentives for a mature, growth-oriented economy; the narrower income dif-ferentials encountered in continental Europe are rationalized as necessary for the protectionof the less-well paid and the integrity of the social fabric. The upward secular trend in wageinequality in the US since the 1970s, which is a stark reversal of the pattern observed duringthe preceding 40 years, is also a topic attracting wide public and scholarly attention.Despite the importance of the subject and the amount of attention that it has received,the extensive literature on the economic impact of wage bargaining institutions in advanceddemocratic societies contains only a few widely accepted findings. One of these is that morecentralized bargaining institutions strongly encourage wage equality. No less an authoritativeorgan than the OECD notes, for instance, that “there is a fairly robust relation betweencross-country differences in earnings inequality and bargaining structures” (OECD 1997,p. 64). Several well-designed country-specific studies support the claim that the system ofcollective bargaining is a major determinant of variations in the extent of wage inequality(Hibbs and Locking, 1996, 2000, Erickson and Ichino, 1995). Yet even the most careful andwell executed country level results may be affected by idiosyncratic country-specific factors.Evidence at the cross-national level is required. The most careful and convincing cross-national empirical documentation of the link between centralized bargaining institutionsand wage inequality appears in Wallerstein (1999), published in this journal

Wage pacts and economic growth

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to theoretically investigate the impact of wage pacts on economic growth.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents an innovation driven endogenous growth model, where firms and unions bargain over wages.FindingsFinds that the degree of centralization of the bargaining structure plays a crucial rule for economic performance. Central bargaining, which incorporates the leapfrogging externality incorporated in firm‐level bargaining, will yield lower rates of unemployment for a given rate of economic growth. The increase in labor resources will in turn also yield faster growth rates in a corporatist economy. Indeed, when unions focus on issues other than short term wage increases, they may even outperform the non‐unionized economy, as they can internalize the knowledge externality through long‐term wage moderation pacts.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper is theoretical with some anecdotal evidence, and lacks thorough empirical testing.Practical implicationsThere are strong implications for economic policy, suggesting the promotion of wage pacts. Before implementation, prior empirical conformation of the results is required.Originality/valueThis is the first paper that demonstrates under which conditions unions can promote economic growth and reduce unemployment through long‐term wage pacts.

Forcing German managers to focus on productivity

PurposeAims to test Walton and McKersie’s theory on labour negotiations, specifically in the case of German car manufacturers.Design/methodology/approachThe research is based on interviews with industrial actors in Germany’s car industry – an empirical case study.FindingsThe article explains the structural force behind the managerial drive towards production. While German managers act at an enterprise level, a structural force has been responsible for the success of Germany’s post‐WW II manufacturing. Germany’s collective bargaining structure removed wage and working‐time bargaining from local management and opened four managerial options: production, productivity, innovation, and quality. This structure forced management to focus on these four options because they lie within the realm of management prerogative. The article explains how structural divisions betweenintra‐enterprise level arrangements andextra‐enterprise level collective bargaining at a conceptual level can best be understood.Originality/valueArgues that a regional and industry collective bargaining structure has supported the success of a competitive car industry in Germany.

The employer's perspective on collective bargaining centralization: an analytical framework

Despite the continuing debates about the performance implications of different degrees of collective bargaining centralization, our understanding of the determinants of bargaining structures is still limited. While recent research has largely focused on macro-level factors, the role of micro-level determinants has still not been systematically scrutinized. This article develops a multi-disciplinary framework for analysing the employer's perspective on collective bargaining centralization and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of different forms and levels of collective bargaining from the perspective of management, the main focus being on the comparison between single-employer and multi-employer collective bargaining. This framework can be used for qualitative and quantitative empirical research as well as for discussions of the costs and benefits of different levels of collective bargaining.

Converging Divergence: How Competitive Advantages Condition Institutional Change under EMU*

Recognizing that the institutional design of EMU leads to the co-ordination of national wage-bargaining structures, this article asks why bargaining systems in some EMU Member States have become co-ordinated and centralized, whereas others have become co-ordinated and decentralized. In contrast to neoliberal theory, it is argued that different bargaining levels are best explained by a country's competitive advantage: whilst countries with a competitive advantage in high-quality manufacturing favour a centralized bargaining system which supports a high-skill strategy, countries with a competitive advantage in low-cost production prefer decentralized bargaining structures which accommodate high wage differentials within the various employment categories of an industry. Thus, even though EMU asserts unilateral pressure for institutional change, it does not lead to the convergence of national institutions.

Outcomes of Bargaining Structures in the Ontario and Saskatchewan Construction Industries

This article seeks to evaluate how legislations redesigning bargaining structures in the Ontario and Saskatchewan construction industry influenced employer and union organizations and to estimate its effects on strike activity, negotiated wage settlements and nonwage outcomes.

The Effect of Bargaining Structure on Negotiated Wage Settlements

The purpose of this paper is to explore the effect of the structure of collective bargaining on union bargaining power. More specifically, its objective is to determine whether bargaining through employer's association, multi-employer, single (multi-plant) employer or single-plant negotiation units has had an effect on negotiated wage settlements (union wage changes) in the private sector in Canada.

Decentralized Bargaining : Its Problems and Direction in Ontario and the Western Provinces

This paper is directed to the bargaining structure issue and examines the problems and direction of decentralized bargaining in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario

Collective Bargaining in the Public Sector : A Re-Examination

This paper calls for a new direction in the study of public sector collective bargaining away from the «issue» and «problem» approach in favor of a re-examination, in the light of our experience over the past decade, of the physiology of the technique itself with particular reference to the appropriateness of current public sector collective bargaining structures.

Local Employer and Union Perceptions of Two-Tier Bargaining

This study examines local union and employer views of the concept and operation of a two-tier bargaining structure for teacher contract negotiations in Saskatchewan. The results are based on a survey of 138 local union and trustee representatives' views of collective bargaining under a centralized multiemployer arrangement with supplementary local negotiations.

Political Exchange and Bargaining Reform in Italy and Spain

Wage bargaining structures in Italy and Spain changed significantly in the 1990s. This is usually seen as an employer-led response to exogenous pressures such as the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). This article shows that while EMU acted as a catalyst for negotiated adjustments, changes in wage bargaining are better explained through factors endogenous to national systems, in particular union strategies and interactions in the policy-making arena. By means of policy concertation and political exchange, unions have shaped institutional change in collective bargaining so as to avoid a disorganized decentralization of labour relations.

Wage Differences between Men and Women in Austria: Evidence from 1983 and 1997

In most OECD countries the wage gap between men and women has declined during the past two decades. Developments of the last 20 years, e.g. increased labour market attachment of women, changes in the bargaining structure, and the introduction of equal pay laws, may have reduced the gender wage gap. We investigate the extent, persistence, and socio-economic determinants of the gender wage gap in Austria, for the years 1983 and 1997. Using wage decomposition techniques, we find that the average gender wage gap was almost as high in 1997 as it was in 1983. Not accounting for differences, the gender wage gap dropped from 25.5 to 23.3 per cent. Taking observable differences between men and women into account, we estimate that the mean gender wage gap which cannot be explained, i.e. discrimination against women, dropped from 18 to 15.5 per cent of men’s wages. The drop in discrimination is the main reason for the narrowing of the gender wage gap.

The Impact of Institutions on the Employment Performance in European Labour Markets

This paper investigates the role of institutions for labour market performance across European countries. As participation rates have been rather stable over the past, the unemployment problem is mainly caused by shortages in labour demand. Labour demand is expressed by its structural parameters, such as the elasticities of employment to output and factor prices. Institutional variables include employment protection legislation, the structure of wage bargaining, measures describing the tax and transfer system and active labour market policies. As cointegration between employment, output and factor prices is detected, labour demand equations are fitted in levels by efficient estimation techniques. To account for possible structural change, time varying parameter models and aysmmetries due to the business cycle situation are considered. Then, labour demand elasticities are explained by institutions using panel fixed effects regressions. The results suggest that higher flexibility and incentives of households to work appear to be appropriate strategies to improve the employment record. The employment response to economic conditions is stronger in a more deregulated environment, and the absorption of shocks can be relieved. However, the institutional database should be improved in order to arrive at more definite policy conclusions.

Nominal Wage Flexibility and Institutions: Preliminary Micro-Evidence from the Europanel

This paper analyses wage dynamics at individual level using the European Community Household Panel data. We compare yearly wage changes of full-time employees staying in the same firm for twelve European countries during the 1994-96 time-period. For all the European countries we find evidence of nominal wage rigidity. The percentage of employees receiving no wage changes is different across countries, with Germany and Ireland ranking at the top and the bottom respectively. At the same time, nominal wage cuts are not rare. We therefore consider the impact of the bargaining structure and institutions in the European labor markets on the extent of nominal wage flexibility observed.

Re-conceptualising Labour Market Regulationin Australia and New Zealand

This paper seeks to broaden traditional assumptions that the study of industrial relations makes about regulation. Industrial relations researchers have been interested in institutional regulation since the Webbs and Commons examined the development of unions, minimum standards and collective bargaining in the United Kingdom and the United States. This tradition provides a narrow conception of institutions as structures rather than processes, norms, rituals or habits. A contemporary manifestation of this narrow conception is the preoccupation of industrial relations researchers with changing institutional structures, such as declining levels of trade union density and the decentralization of bargaining structures. Often overlooked in such analyses are important questions about the functions institutions perform, and how these functions endure in times of institutional change. This paper outlines changes to the Australian and New Zealand systems of industrial relations from the 1990s, and examines how the systems' traditional regulatory functions continue 10 be performed following the introduction of new institutions and bargaining structures.