Union Wage Practices and Wage Dispersion within Establishments

Richard Freeman

ILR Review, 1982, vol. 36, issue 1, 3-21

Abstract: This study analyzes establishment-level data primarily to examine the effect of unionism on the wage structure within establishments. The major finding is that within-establishment dispersion of wages is significantly narrower in unionized than in nonunionized establishments, a pattern the author attributes in large part to unions' wage practices, such as single rate or automatic-progression modes of wage payment as opposed to merit reviews and individual wage determination. The data also show that dispersion in average wages is narrower among organized plants, but by more modest amounts than the within-establishment differential. Overall, the evidence suggests a major role for explicit union wage policies in explaining the dispersion of wages within firms and in the economy as a whole.

Date: 1982
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (115)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/001979398203600101 (text/html)

Related works:
Working Paper: Union Wage Practices and Wage Dispersion within Establishments (1981)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:36:y:1982:i:1:p:3-21

DOI: 10.1177/001979398203600101

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in ILR Review from Cornell University, ILR School
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().