Trading Places: Employers, Unions and the Manufacture of Voice

Alex Bryson, Rafael Gomez and P Willman

CEP Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Performance, LSE

Abstract: Using nationally representative workplace data for Britain we show that over the last quarter century union voice - especially union-only voice - has been associated with poorer climate, more industrial action, poorer financial performance and poorer labour productivity than nonunion voice and, in particular, direct voice. On the other hand, union-based voice regimes have experienced lower quit rates than non-union and "no voice" regimes, as theory predicts. Over that time, while the workplace incidence of voice has remained constant, with roughly 8 workplaces out of 10 providing some form of voice, there has been a big shift from union to non-union voice, particularly direct employer-made voice. Thus employers are prepared generally to bear the costs of voice provision and manifest a reluctance to engage with their workforce without voice mechanisms in place. The associations between non-union voice mechanisms and desirable workplace outcomes suggest that these costs may be lower than the benefits voice generates.

Keywords: worker voice; trade unions; quits; employment relations; labour productivity; financial performance; industrial action (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J5 J51 J52 J53 L25 M54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec and nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Trading places: employers, unions and the manufacture of voice (2008)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp0884

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