Willingness Of Employers Research Articles

Outsourcing and union power

The outsourcing of union work and jobs either diffuses or diminishes union membership, depending on perspective and situation. The correlation of trends in union membership to trends in union power, while less than perfect, has until recently been relatively strong over the past sixteen years. The fact that as diverse a sample of unions as AFSCME, SEIU, and UAW have chosen to make outsourcing a prominent labor/public relations issue suggests that the correlation continues to be perceived by the union movement to be significant, notwithstanding the efforts of the “new” leadership of the AFL-CIO to break that link with respect to union political power by “taxing” member unions and their members to contribute both money and militancy to the 1996 election cycle. Although outsourcing may lead only to the diffusion of union membership either within or between unions, as opposed to the diminution of union membership, this fact has not received a great deal of attention. The net effect on total union membership of outsourcing from one union employer to another union employer is unclear, although the effect on the membership of the union at the outsourcing employer is not. The redistribution of membership within a union as a result of outsourcing is likely to have little immediate impact on union power. However, as even the best case scenario presented above suggests, it may have significant long-run deleterious effects on union bargaining power by taking labor out of a sheltered market and putting it into potentially competitive market. This is particularly likely to be the case when outsourcing (1) places the outsourced work into a different industry or wage contour and (2) creates the possibility of moving from sole-source to multiplesource supplier arrangements. The redistribution of membership between unions as a result of outsourcing is unlikely to have a major impact on union power broadly defined. It can have, however, serious deleterious effects in terms of the power of an individual union, as suggested in my “competitive case” scenario. The fact that one union’s losses due to outsourcing may be another union’s gain is of little consolation to the losing union. That act, in and of itself, may make the threat of outsourcing a potential union “Achilles heel” at the bargaining table by placing it into competition with some other, perhaps unknown, union as well as possibly nonunion competition. The most obvious threat to union power comes from outsourcing that diminishes union membership overall by transferring jobs from union to nonunion employers. The willingness and ability of employers to move work/jobs entirely out of the orbit of union control constitutes, in terms of power and particularly union bargaining power, a revisitation of the phenomenon of the “runaway shop.” It may also be viewed as a proactive form of hiring permanent replacements for (potentially) striking workers. The union options in dealing with such a challenge are to endeavor to preclude outsourcing through legislation or collective bargaining or to chase the work by organizing the unorganized, hopefully with the help of the unionized outsourcing employer. Neither option may be easy, but as the 1996 auto industry negotiations suggest, the former may be less difficult than the latter. The possibility that outsourcing from union to nonunion employer may provide unions with the power to organize from the top (outsourcer) down (outsourcee) cannot be entirely ignored as the issue of supplier “neutrality” reportedly was raised in the 1996 auto negotiations. The adverse effects of outsourcing on union political and financial power, by virtue of its impact on the level or distribution of union membership, can and may well be offset by an increase in union activism—as measured by dues levels, merger activity, organizing commitment, and political action. The adverse effects of outsourcing on union bargaining power are more problematical from the union standpoint. The effect of outsourcing, whatever its rationale or scenario, appears to be to put union labor back into competition. Thus, outsourcing constitutes yet another challenge to the labor movement in its ongoing and seemingly increasingly unsuccessful battle to take and keep U.S. union labor out of competition by proving itself able and willing to organize to the extent of the market and standardizing wages in that market.

Unionization in the United States and India: An Empirical Investigation

Union voting intentions of 622 employees in the United States and 120 employees in India were investigated. Union beliefs and job satisfaction influenced voting intentions in both countries. Employer's willingness to correct workplace problems, presence of union members in the family, employment in the public sector, gender, and level of education influenced union voting intentions only in the U.S. sample.

Employer Attitudes Toward Hiring Ex-Offenders

The purposes of this article are to determine (a) employer attitudes toward hiring ex-offenders and (b) how these attitudes are affected by the level of training the ex-offender received while incarcerated, government incentives to hire, type of offense committed, and the relationship of the crime to the job to be filled. Eighty-three Houston and Dallas employers were surveyed on their attitudes toward hiring ex-offenders. In general, although the initial willingness to hire ex-offenders was low among employers, other findings indicate that the level of education, government incentives, and the relationship of the crime to the job increase employer willingness to hire an ex-offender. The type of offense, however, when disclosed, appears to have a negative effect on employers' willingness to hire, especially toward those with violent and sexual crimes as well as crimes against children. Limitations and policy applications of the findings are also discussed.

Employer's willingness to pay: the case for compulsory health insurance in Tanzania.

This article documents employers' expenditure on the arrangements for the health care of their employees in one of the least developed countries; Tanzania. The case for compulsory health insurance is considered in the light of the fact that only 3% of the population is employed in the formal sector and could be covered at first. It is shown from a survey of larger employers, outside government, that they were spending on average 11% of payroll on health care for their employees. This demonstrated their lack of satisfaction with the government health services. Nevertheless, those who could readily be covered by insurance were making considerable use of the more expensive government hospital services. It is argued that a compulsory health insurance scheme could be introduced for the formal sector of employment which would cover a wider range of health services at lower cost. The scheme would also have the desirable economic effect of lowering employers' labour costs while making it possible to improve the standards of the government health services.

The Political Economy of Control

This article argues that the structural inequality literature lacks a theoretical logic capable of rivaling that of its neoclassical counterpart, and that this, rather than its empirical veracity, has served as the major barrier to its broader acceptance. Accordingly, this article attempts to develop an analytical theory that both provides an alternative logic and can be demonstrated empirically. To do so, it argues (in essence) that the main contribution of a structuralist theory should be to logically demonstrate why and how nonmarket, political factors are of central importance to income determination. It then draws on an organizational theory of the firm in industrial relations developed elsewhere to (a) establish the importance of “political economy” in accounting for variation in the willingness of employers to grant favorable terms of employment, and (b) analyze the data from a unique survey of unionized firms.

The Duration of Post-Injury Absences from Work

The authors use three duration models to estimate the effects of disability benefits on the hazard of returning to work and on the expected duration of work absences. The results show that disincentives exist even when disability benefits are not conditioned on the recipient remaining out of work. In addition, blacks and women are found to be absent longer than white men. Durations of work absences are also influenced by available wages, the type and severity of injury, the physical demands of the jobs for which the worker is qualified, and the willingness of employers to help the worker return to work. Copyright 1990 by MIT Press.

EDUCATION AND ECONOMIC DECLIN, 1890-1980S

Over the last hundred years or so there has been a persistent belief that the relative decline of the British economy has been underlain by defects in our education. The argument that I wish to put forward here is that whatever the defects of technical and scientific education in the 1870s and 1880s, the situation radically improved in the 1890s and 1900s and it is fallacious to regard the whole period 18701914asoneinwhichdefectsofprovisionhinderedindustrialperformance. The more lasting problem was not so much the provision of technical education as the willingness of employers to receive its products. This was compounded by the liberal education values entrenched in the education of the upper classes at the public schools and Oxford. The focussing by historians on the defects of the pre-1914 period has also diverted attention from perhaps the most serious issue of all, namely the failure in the twentieth century to develop a technical education for teenagers of school age.

Relationship between accreditation status and hourly wages of Medical Record Technicians

Using data from a 1975 hospital wage survey conducted by the Industry Wage Division of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the relationship between accreditation status and hourly wages of 590 female full-time medical record technicians (MRT's) in four metropolitan areas was examined. Through multiple regression analysis, the hourly wages of Accredited Record Technicians were found to be $ 0.62 greater than those not accredited. Job location and hospital funding source also were related strongly to MRT hourly wages. Only 35 percent of the MRT's studied were accredited. These data reveal the willingness of employers to hire MRT's not accredited, while being willing to pay a premium for accreditation.

Accounting for everybody

Increasing trade union pressure for worker participation in industrial decision‐making, and the growing willingness of employers to concede the point, will have important implications for colleges offering accounting courses for the non‐accountant.

THE PAY‐ROLL SURCHARGE

WHAT EFFECT is Mr Selwyn Lloyd's suspended pay‐roll tax likely to have on apprentices and other young workers? According to a remarkable statement put out by the Industrial Training Council, it could well “affect the willingness of employers to expand training arrangements for young people and do much to undermine the council's work”. While the Council's work might be undermined, we doubt whether the pay‐roll tax would make any real difference to the expansion of facilities for training young people in industry. In the short run it might make a marginal difference. In the long term it could do nothing but good. If the Chancellor has real convictions about the way an employee surcharge could lead to more effective use of the country's manpower — by more rapid introduction of automatic and labour saving devices and, concomitantly, by provision of adequate arrangements to train and retrain the skilled workers to man them — we hope he will follow those European countries which have had a pay‐roll tax for years and where the arrangements for training apprentices are much more advanced than those in Great Britain. Why should we be afraid to follow the Continental example?