UK unions, collective action and the cost disease

Paul Willman, Alex Bryson and John Forth

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: This article looks at the financial resources of trade unions in the UK. The core argument is that trade unions are subject to ‘cost disease’ pressures such that costs rise over the long term above the general level of inflation. They have this property because of the difficulty in solving first- and second-order collective action problems. First-order problems refer to the problems of initiating collective action and second-order problems refer to the management of collective action organizations. Both UK aggregate and case-study data — from one of the largest UK unions, Unite — are presented to illustrate the cost disease problem and to suggest options for its management. In conclusion, the wider implications of ‘cost disease’ pressures for unions are assessed.

JEL-codes: J01 R14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 24 pages
Date: 2020-06-01
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published in British Journal of Industrial Relations, 1, June, 2020, 58(2), pp. 447 - 470. ISSN: 0007-1080

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/100874/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: UK Unions, Collective Action and the Cost Disease (2020)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:100874

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