Why Only Some Industries Unionize: Insights from Reciprocity Theory

Sean Flynn

No 64, Vassar College Department of Economics Working Paper Series from Vassar College Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper argues that the degree to which a given industry’s labor contracts are complete or incomplete is the major factor determining whether its workforce will be unionized. For instance, assembly line industries feature complete labor contracts because of the nature of the production technology: Either a worker keeps up with the line, or he does not. In such a situation, there is no chance for a reciprocal gift exchange under which firms offer high wages in exchange for high effort levels. The result is low wages that make workers prone to unionization. By contrast, jobs that feature incomplete contracts (lawyers, computer programmers, economists) already have reciprocity and gift exchange in place. Such benefits guarantee to workers that their better interests will be looked after by a management that wishes to maintain a positive and productive labor-management interaction.

Date: 2004-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://irving.vassar.edu/VCEWP/VCEWP64.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found (http://irving.vassar.edu/VCEWP/VCEWP64.pdf [302 Redirect]--> http://economics.vassar.edu/VCEWP/VCEWP64.pdf [301 Moved Permanently]--> https://www.vassar.edu/economics/VCEWP/VCEWP64.pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Why only some industries unionize: insights from reciprocity theory (2005)
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:vas:papers:64

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Vassar College Department of Economics Working Paper Series from Vassar College Department of Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sean Flynn ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).