Notesale: Turn your study into money

Document Preview

Extracts from the notes are below, to see the PDF you'll receive please use the links above

---

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29
DOI 10
...
Freeman

Published online: 18 September 2012
# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012

Abstract This paper explores the link between employee perceptions of working
conditions and the desire for worker representation in Britain and the US
...
The nature of workplaces, as opposed to employees’ characteristics, is the predominant factor determining employee perceptions of
poor working conditions
...
Worker representation
...
Budd 2004) argue that it
is the treatment of labor as “substantively human” (Kaufman 2010: 86) that sets
Industrial Relations apart from classical orthodox economics
...
Capital may be able to buy units of labor but the realisation of
value requires that capital harnesses labor power at the point of production (Marx
1867)
...
At issue

A
...
bryson@niesr
...
uk
R
...
Freeman
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
e-mail: rbfreeman@gmail
...
It is often assumed that worker
perceptions of poor working conditions trigger worker desire for a collective voice to
enhance their bargaining power vis-a-vis the employer
...
2 But it is only recently that analysts have
used large-scale survey data to examine the links between perceptions of poor
working conditions and the desire for worker representation (Freeman et al
...

Using data for the United States and Britain collected at the end of the Twentieth
Century we contribute to this literature by exploring the distribution and correlates of
perceptions of poor working conditions in the two countries, and how these perceptions
relate to worker desire for union representation
...
One might imagine that greater prosperity and
public policy interventions such as minimum wages and health and safety standards might
have reduced worker concerns about their working conditions, thus reducing the desire for
worker representation
...
Equally, this may not be
the case at all
...
In a sense the issue is analogous to debate
regarding relative poverty
...
This, in turn, engenders a desire for redistributive policies
...
Our three
data sources are not directly comparable
...

The question therefore arises as to how one might configure these data to generalise
about the correlates of perceptions of working conditions and the link to the desire for
representation across workers and countries
...

Our data include, but are not confined to job satisfaction measures
...
The scalar measure allows us to compare
perceptions across our two countries despite differences in the specific questions in
the surveys
...
Using linked employer-employee data for Britain we show that much of the
variation in employee perceptions of poor working conditions arises from their
workplace, some of which can be traced to specific workplace practices
...
unionhistory
...
php
http://en
...
org/wiki/Justice_for_Janitors

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

3

find that the components of the perceived working conditions scale are highly intercorrelated and that scores based on them have high statistical reliability and are less
subject to measurement error than single-survey items, such as job satisfaction
...

In Section Two we review the literature on working conditions and the desire for
representation
...
Section Four presents results, including the
distribution and correlates of perceptions of working conditions and their link to the
desire for union representation
...


Previous Literature on Working Conditions and the Desire
for Union Representation
Most surveys do not ask employees about their working conditions
...
First
Findings from the most recent report indicate that progress towards better employment is uneven over time and there is a great deal of variance in working conditions
across the Member States of the EU (European Foundation 2010)
...
), together with perceptions of job quality, often proxied by employee job satisfaction
...
Green (2006) surveys much of this literature
...
(2006) pointed to recent improvements in employee
perceptions of job quality in Britain, albeit in the context of rising job-related stress
...
From
a theoretical perspective, frustration, dissatisfaction and alienation in one’s work are central
to social psychologists’ models of union joining (Klandermans 1986) and, in industrial
relations, to Kelly’s mobilisation theory (1998)
...
However, it is arguable that it is precisely
these perceptions of working conditions, rather than “actual” conditions, that one is
interested in when examining the link between those conditions and employees’
propensity for union representation
...

One such measure of perceived conditions is job satisfaction, as noted above
...
The puzzle in this literature is that there appears to
be a negative association between union membership and job satisfaction, one which
may or may not be causal (Bryson et al
...
2010)
...
Workers organize in order for
unions to have an effect on their terms and conditions, and the union wage premium
literature is testimony to the fact that they do have such an impact
...
They may do so by increasing
employee awareness of their relative position in the workplace, a rational way for unions
to engender worker dissatisfaction and thus galvanize their bargaining position vis-a-vis
the employer
...
But in this paper we are not
examining the link between working conditions and union status
...

Measures of employee desire for representation are rarely available in social surveys
...
Hart Research Associates for the United States casts doubt on
the proposition that general improvements in working conditions have reduced workers’ desire for union representation
...
The proportion of non-union workers who
say they would vote for a union rises over the period, to exceed 50 per cent in 2003
and 2005
...
Nevertheless,
the upward trend runs against explanations of declining union density in terms of
falling worker interest in unions
...


The Measurement of Perceptions of Working Conditions
Our analysis uses data from two British surveys and one US survey
...

1999)
...
The management
survey was conducted in 2,191 workplaces with a response rate of 80 per cent
...

Self-completion questionnaires were distributed to a random sample of 25 employees
in workplaces with 25 or more workers and to all employees in workplaces with 10–
24
...
If desire for unionisation is constant over time, declines in union density should raise the proportion
of non-organized workers who want unionism
...
The increase in unfilled demand for unionisation in the 1990s
through to 2005 runs against this story
...
1 Non-union Worker Likely Vote in Union Representation Election, Peter Hart Surveys, 1984–2005
...
Those year’s data are from Harris, on a
slightly differently worded question: “If an election were held tomorrow to decide whether your workplace
would be unionized or not, do you think you would definitely vote for a union, probably vote for a union,
probably vote against a union, or definitely vote against a union?”

returned
...

The second British survey is The British Worker Representation and Participation
Survey 2001 (BWRPS), which is a face-to-face interview conducted as part of the
monthly BMRB Access Omnibus survey
...
The weighting schema ensures that demographic profiles
match those for all employees in Great Britain aged 15 or over
...

Variation in the conditions employees face at work is likely to reflect a range of
factors including the quality of management, the nature of the labor process undertaken
to produce the good or service, firm profitability - which affects firms’ ability to pay for
improvements in working conditions - and the standards set at country level by
legislation, or via collective bargaining at sectoral, firm or workplace level
...
The survey includes weights to
allow the analyst to run population estimates
...
1999: 91–92)
...


6

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

because conditions within the workplace may vary according to the job performed and
worker knowledge about the rest of the workplace, but also because workers will have
different perceptions and expectations regarding those conditions
...

Traditionally, analysts have focused on single measures, such as overall job satisfaction or perceptions of the climate of employment relations, the factors that determine
them, and the influence of the subjective variables on intended or actual worker
behavior such as quits (Freeman 1978)
...
By itself any single item
captures only part of any underlying latent variable such as the conditions employees
face at work that will influence worker desire for union representation
...

A single item may change in salience depending on external factors, such as the point
in the business cycle
...
Similarly, a worker who may have difficulties with the
way their supervisor scheduled work may be satisfied with a host of other issues
...
With different surveys
asking somewhat different questions about particular conditions, a multi-item scale
offers the possibility of comparing responses across surveys in a relatively simple
way
...
The same principle applies in other areas such as health
...

Accordingly, we developed a poor working conditions scalar measure to compare
responses to questions between the US and British surveys, and between the two British
surveys
...
We summed these measures to obtain the total number of conditions that
employees thought were poor and divided the sum by the total number of working
conditions the respondents were asked about
...
Scaling by the number of
relevant questions facilitates comparisons of the perceived poor working conditions
across the different questions and surveys
...
The tables for
each workplace also provide the mean and standard deviation for each composite item
...
Workers are asked whether there are problems at their workplace relating to

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

7

unfair wages, discipline and dismissal, bullying, discrimination, and preferential treatment
by management
...
They are asked a number of questions rating management at the workplace
in relation to issues such as understanding family responsibilities, keeping everyone up-todate, and encouraging skill development
...
Finally we compute an “influence gap” which is the gap between what
influence workers say they have and the influence they would like (see the appendix for
details)
...

Asked about unfair practices, the most common was preferential treatment by
management or senior staff, followed by payment of unfair wages, unfair dismissal,
discipline and bullying, with discrimination the least cited problem
...
We have collapsed them into
0–1 dummy variables by identifying those in the bottom or bottom two categories as
perceiving poor conditions
...

Thirty-nine percent of workers cited at least one poor working condition
...
0 (worker reports poor
conditions for every item they answered on the survey)
...
17 which explains 89 % of the variance
...
761)
...

We followed a similar strategy in analyzing the 13 WERS questions eliciting
employee perceptions of working conditions (Appendix Table 8)
...
The items are highly correlated with one another
...
82 which explains 93 % of the
variance
...
867)
...
So, for example, the
difference between the influence workers had and the influence they wanted, which
was referred to above, was originally asked in WRPS (Freeman and Rogers 1999)
...
The factor analysis reveals a
slightly more complicated data structure than in the case of the British surveys
...
Eight
of the thirteen items load on the first factor which has an Eigen value of 2
...
60
...


8

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

second factor (Eigen value 1
...
The remaining factor (Eigen value 1
...

In sum, for all of our data sets we computed a new additive scale capturing
employees’ perceptions of poor working conditions which we treat as a latent factor
likely to create desire for collective voice
...
We begin with discussion of the distribution of
employee perceptions of poor working conditions across workers, and then among
workers within the same workplace
...

The Distribution of Poor Working Conditions
Figure 2 graphs the distribution of employee perceptions of poor working conditions
for the three surveys
...
The mode occurs
at zero poor conditions and the proportion of workers reporting poor conditions
declines nearly monotonically
...
Ten percent of workers accounted for 52 % of all the reported poor
conditions
...
There is a comparable bunching of
responses at zero followed by a declining proportion reporting a higher number of
poor conditions
...

The figure gives the mean and variance for the scalar measure of poor conditions
for each survey
...
134 and 0
...
156 and 0
...
211 and 0
...
All three distributions diverge
from the distribution of perceived poor working conditions that would be generated
by a binomial distribution in which a worker had an independent random chance of
reporting a poor condition on an item at the average rate reported in the sample
...
The variance of the distribution
would be (1-P) P, where P is the fraction of responses that reported poor conditions
...
7 The reason the distribution
6

An alternative approach is to use the full information in the distribution of responses on each question so
that the additive scale weights responses according to how much of a problem it was
...

7
We regressed ln (the % reporting number of poor conditions) on the number of poor conditions to fit an
exponential distribution and regressed ln (the % reporting number of poor conditions) on ln (the number of
poor conditions) to fit a power law
...


J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

9

A: BWRPS (mean = 0
...
030)
20

15

%
10

5

0
0

5
10
15
Number of Poor Conditions, BWRPS

20

B: WERS (mean =0
...
057)
30

20

%

10

0
0

5
10
Number of Poor Conditions, WERS

15

C: WRPS (mean = 0
...
022)
30

20
%

10

0
0

5
10
Number of Poor Conditions in US

Fig
...
Knowing that a worker reports poor conditions on any item gives information about their likelihood of reporting poor
conditions on other items
...
One possibility is that it reflects workers’ personal characteristics
...
The other possibility is that the non-independence reflects attributes of the workplace, which
most workers would report
...
The former would likely produce a general
desire for representation at a workplace, while the latter would not
...
Nor do they permit identification of the individual component of
perceived poor conditions since they do not follow workers from one workplace to
another
...
The result is a data
file that contains reports by different workers in the same workplace – the information
necessary to identify a fixed workplace effect for employee perceptions of working
conditions
...
This
gave us an average of 14
...

We tabulated the poor conditions reported by workers for each workplace and
ranked the workplaces by average number of poor working conditions
...
23 poor
conditions on the WERS scale from 0 to 13 – giving it a scale measure of 0
...
74, a scalar measure of 0
...
Alternatively, poor conditions
averaged 1
...
09 at the 90th percentile
...

We compared the variance in poor working conditions explained by individuals’
demographic and job characteristics with the variance explained by workplace fixed
effects
...
2 in models containing only workplace
fixed effects and 0
...
When
the two are combined the R2 rises to around 0
...
It is therefore clear that a large proportion of the
variance in employee perceptions of poor working conditions is accounted for by the
workplace employing them
...


8

The mean values and standard deviation for each independent variable from the three surveys used in the
analyses are presented in the data appendix
...
203

0
...
256

R-sq unweighted
model

0
...
089

0
...
24
P>f00
...
68
p>f00
...
They are: female, age (6 dummies),
ethnicity, health problem, married or living as married, academic qualifications (6 dummies), vocational
qualifications, occupation (9 dummies), tenure (4 dummies), hours (5 dummies), gender segregation on the
job (5 dummies), banded gross weekly wages (11 dummies), permanent contract

The Correlates of Employee Perceptions of Poor Working Conditions and the Link
to Desire for Union Representation in Britain
We established above that, together with workplace factors, the characteristics of
workers affect perceptions of the number of poor working conditions they report
...
Concentrating on the WERS linked
employer-employee data we examine this relationship for Britain and then consider
the relationship between perceived poor working conditions and the desire for unions
...

Table 2 gives the regression coefficients and t-statistics for estimates of the
individual-level correlates of employees’ perceptions of poor working conditions,
with dummy variables controlling for workplace fixed effects
...
9 The model in column 1 explains roughly
one-quarter of the variance in perceptions of poor working conditions
...

This might seem counterintuitive given unions’ efforts to tackle poor conditions but,
as discussed earlier, the finding is consistent with the job satisfaction literature that
finds a positive correlation between membership and job dissatisfaction when membership is treated as exogenous despite the well-established tendency for unions to be
associated with lower quit rates (Freeman 1978; Hammer and Avgar 2005; Bryson et
9

Union membership is not exogenous with respect to perceptions of poor working conditions, of course
...


12

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

al
...
Women perceive fewer poor working conditions than men, again
reflecting findings in the job satisfaction literature
...
Those with health problems
perceive more poor conditions than those with good health, and the number of poor
conditions perceived rises with qualifications
...
Perceptions of poor conditions rise with workplace tenure and with
hours worked and fall with earnings
...
Gender, age and health effects are more pronounced
among members than non-members
...

Table 3 identifies the workplace correlates of employee perceptions of poor
working conditions in WERS
...
Column 1 regresses
the coefficients on each workplace from the first stage employee-level estimates of
poor conditions using identical individual-level covariates to those used in column 1
of Table 2 on various measures of workplace characteristics and labor policies: these
estimates indicate what sorts of workplaces appear to generate the greatest number of
poor working conditions, as perceived by their employees
...
10 The results
are similar using either dependent variable, showing statistically significant relations
between workplace characteristics and policies and the aggregate number of poor
working conditions perceived by employees, though they explain only a small
amount of the total variance in perceptions of poor conditions
...
They are lowest of all in the hotels and restaurants sector followed
by ‘other services’ which includes sectors such as charitable and welfare organizations
...
Whereas being female is associated
with a lower likelihood of perceiving poor conditions, the number of poor working
conditions at a workplace rises with the percentage of female workers at the
workplace
...
Autonomous team-working is negatively correlated with poor working conditions, a finding
that is consistent with the literature that stresses the importance of job control in
improving worker well-being (Hackman 1987)
...
11
In the light of the literature on worker voice and its ability to elicit worker
dissatisfaction (Freeman and Medoff 1984) the relationship between working

10

The maximum workplace mean of poor perceived conditions in the data is 10
...
The
mean value for the workplace mean is 3
...

11
Specialists are designated according to their job title
...
334 (4
...
451 (5
...
717 (4
...
264(2
...
153 (1
...
093 (0
...
190(1
...
470 (4
...
489 (1
...
450 (3
...
404 (3
...
120 (0
...
957(5
...
275 (1
...
397 (1
...
065 (0
...
410 (3
...
259 (1
...
125 (3
...
887 (4
...
317 (1
...
073 (0
...
634 (4
...
982 (3
...
041 (0
...
177 (1
...
399 (2
...
068 (0
...
183 (1
...
336 (1
...
045 (0
...
568 (5
...
507 (2
...
593 (5
...
787 (6
...
881 (3
...
667 (5
...
976 (7
...
909 (3
...
922 (6
...
179 (7
...
068 (3
...
144 (6
...
162 (2
...
039 (0
...
314 (4
...
454 (7
...
612 (4
...
410 (6
...
703 (3
...
549 (1
...
771 (3
...
679 (3
...
668 (1
...
662 (2
...
665 (3
...
821 (2
...
779 (4
...
223 (1
...
123 (0
...
420 (2
...
399 (2
...
425 (1
...
471 (2
...
615 (3
...
056 (0
...
876 (4
...
338 (1
...
331 (1
...
438 (2
...
794 (10
...
877 (5
...
786 (9
...
033 (12
...
080 (6
...
008 (10
...
116 (12
...
139 (7
...
087 (9
...
637 (3
...
969 (2
...
505 (2
...
482 (4
...
782 (4
...
320 (2
...
018 (0
...
029 (0
...
072 (0
...
298 (2
...
341 (1
...
343 (2
...
457 (3
...
343 (1
...
467 (3
...
366 (3
...
430 (2
...
232 (2
...
300 (3
...
318 (1
...
286 (2
...
546 (4
...
303 (1
...
632 (4
...
145 (0
...
310 (0
...
277 (1
...
103 (0
...
105 (0
...
208 (1
...
102 (0
...
028 (0
...
129 (0
...
129 (1
...
118 (0
...
377 (2
...
494 (4
...
502 (2
...
582 (3
...
569 (3
...
827 (3
...
560 (3
...
970 (6
...
050 (4
...
033 (5
...
082 (6
...
044 (3
...
370 (7
...
806 (10
...
078 (6
...
668 (7
...
413 (11
...
839 (7
...
433 (9
...
012 (0
...
494 (11
...
26

0
...
19)
2
...
83)**
0
...
091 (0
...
543 (10
...
28

(1) OLS weighted regressions
...
Of these
10,036 work in non-unionized workplaces and 15,326 work in workplaces that recognize unions for
bargaining
(2) T-stats in parentheses
...
** sig at a 99 % CI

conditions and voice mechanisms is of particular note
...
On
the other hand, employer recognition of a union for bargaining purposes is not
significantly associated with poorer working conditions
...

Next we establish the relationship between workers’ perceptions of poor
working conditions and their desire for union representation in WERS
...
The dependent variable is constructed
using responses to following question: ‘ideally who do you think would best
represent you in dealing with managers here about the following issues…
getting increases in my pay; if I wanted to make a complaint about working
here; if a manager wanted to discipline me?’ Pre-coded responses are: myself,
trade union, another employee, somebody else
...
Controlling for individual and job characteristics workers who
perceive a higher number of poor working conditions are significantly more
likely to desire union representation, even among like workers in the same

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

15

Table 3 Workplace correlates of poor working conditions in WERS98
(1)

Employees at workplace

(2)

Workplace Fixed Effects
for Poor Conditions

Average of Worker Perceptions of Poor
Conditions at Workplace

0
...
95)

0
...
53)

Employees at workplace squared

−0
...
74)

−0
...
32)

1,000+ employees in organization

0
...
93)

0
...
92)

Utilities

0
...
53)

0
...
36)

Construction

0
...
74)

0
...
11)

Distribution

−0
...
32)

−0
...
54)

Hotels and restaurants

−0
...
80)**

−0
...
03)**

Transport and communications

−0
...
47)

−0
...
53)

Financial services

−0
...
82)

−0
...
32)*

Business services

−0
...
08)*

−0
...
28)

Public administration

−0
...
52)

−0
...
83)

Education

−0
...
98)

−0
...
47)

Health

−0
...
20)

−0
...
09)

Other services

−0
...
67)**

−0
...
57)*

Industry (ref: manufacturing)

% female

0
...
70)

0
...
64)**

Employment relations specialist at
the workplace

−0
...
04)*

−0
...
06)*

Grievance procedure

−0
...
23)

−0
...
22)

Joint consultative committee

−0
...
32)

−0
...
69)

Union recognition

0
...
38)

0
...
07)

Regular meetings between
management and entire workforce

0
...
98)*

0
...
05)*

Quality circles

0
...
40)

−0
...
42)

−0
...
59)**

−0
...
49)*

Employee share ownership scheme

0
...
61)

0
...
11)

Performance-related pay

0
...
35)

Degree of autonomous team
working (0,4)

Constant
R-sq

−0
...
58)
0
...
109 (0
...
799 (3
...
08

(1) OLS weighted regressions
...
T-statistics in parentheses
...

** significant at a 99 % CI
(2) Column 1’s dependent variable is the workplace fixed-effects coefficients from the first stage employeelevel estimates using identical individual-level covariates to those used in column 1 of Table 2
...
The effect is apparent among union members (column 2) but is
stronger for non-members (column 3)
...
The number of poor working conditions had a positive independent
effect on the likelihood of joining having accounted for demographic, job and
workplace characteristics
...
5
percent increase in the likelihood of joining
...
First we reran the models in Table 4 replacing the
poor working conditions variable with a (0,4) count variable for dissatisfactions on
four job aspects and dummy variables for the other nine poor working conditions
...
In
addition, some of the other measures of poor working conditions were positive and
statistically significant
...
Second, we ran the same models but this time we split the poor
working conditions scale into dissatisfaction, on the one hand, and a second score
containing the other poor working conditions
...
14
The Correlates of Employee Perceptions of Poor Working Conditions and the Link
to Desire for Union Representation in the United States
This section turns to the correlates of worker perceptions of poor working conditions
in the United States and the relationship between poor working conditions and the
desire for union representation, offering an external validation of the results for
Britain
...
The model accounts for roughly one-quarter of the variance in the desire for union representation
among non-members
...
It falls
with tenure and wages
...

14
In these models, available from the authors on request, a simple 9-item count variable containing poor
working conditions other than the four dissatisfaction variables, was positive and statistically significant
having conditioned on the job dissatisfaction count variable and all the other variables in Table 4
...
025, t05
...
017, t02
...
29, t05
...


J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

17

Table 4 Effects of poor working conditions on worker desire for union representation, WERS98
All employees
Number of poor working conditions

Members

Non-members

0
...
016

0
...
78)**

(3
...
68)**

Observations

24,657

10,096

14,561

R-sq

0
...
30

0
...
Score each time respondent says ‘trade union’
(2) OLS with fixed effects weighted by the probability of sample selection
...
Tstatistics in parentheses
...
** significant at a 99 % CI
(3) In addition to the workplace dummies the models contain the same independent variables as those used
in Table 2

possible to estimate workplace fixed effects models
...
These are run for all workers and for union members and non-members
separately
...
Structural features
of the workplace do very little to enhance the explanatory power of the models: they
are not jointly statistically significant
...
The correlation with union membership is positive
...
For instance, gender is not
significant whereas being married or living as married – a variable that was not
significant in Britain – is correlated with lower perceptions of poor working conditions in the US
...

Workers perceive fewer poor conditions where they say the employer has an open
door policy, workplace committees, performance pay, an employee share option plan
(ESOP) and, in the non-union sector, profit-related pay and grievance procedures
...

To establish the link between poor working conditions and the desire for unionization in the United States we regressed the dummy variable identifying whether the
worker would vote for a union if a vote was held today on demographic, job,
workplace and HR policy variables
...
293 (2
...
015 (0
...
259 (0
...
001 (0
...
: 35–44 years)
18–24

−0
...
49)*

0
...
20)

−0
...
40)*

25–34

−0
...
40)

−0
...
49)

−0
...
95)

45–54

−0
...
78)

−0
...
54)

−0
...
68)

55+

−0
...
62)**

−1
...
22)*

−0
...
92)**

Ethnic minority

0
...
76)**

0
...
08)

0
...
09)**

Married/living as married

−0
...
64)**

−0
...
20)*

−0
...
89)

No children

−0
...
70)

−0
...
51)

−0
...
50)

Educational qualifications (ref: high school or below)
Spent some time at college after high school

0
...
37)

0
...
27)

0
...
17)

College graduate or above

−0
...
54)

−0
...
46)

−0
...
39)

Don’t know educational qualifications

0
...
68)

−0
...
09)

0
...
69)

Hours worked per week (ref
...
111 (0
...
402 (0
...
127 (0
...
170 (1
...
375 (1
...
160 (1
...
270 (2
...
934 (1
...
246 (2
...
263 (2
...
976 (1
...
240 (1
...
212 (1
...
759 (1
...
226 (1
...
459 (1
...
149 (2
...
422 (1
...
453 (2
...
173 (0
...
477 (2
...
: <2 years)

Occupation (ref
...
540 (3
...
356 (0
...
597 (3
...
375 (2
...
582 (1
...
407 (2
...
252 (1
...
714 (1
...
274 (1
...
223 (1
...
157 (0
...
276 (1
...
055 (0
...
271 (0
...
066 (0
...
146 (1
...
681 (2
...
087 (0
...
315 (1
...
388 (0
...
287 (1
...
428 (1
...
258 (0
...
433 (1
...
641 (2
...
034 (1
...
638 (2
...
281 (1
...
472 (0
...
291 (1
...
648 (3
...
321 (0
...
649 (2
...
521 (2
...
433 (2
...
463 (1
...
340 (1
...
761 (2
...
203 (0
...
239 (1
...
391 (0
...
263 (1
...
219 (1
...
950 (1
...
071 (0
...
054 (0
...
121 (0
...
108 (0
...
: >$960)

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

19

Table 5 (continued)
All workers

Members

Non-members

Earnings missing

0
...
05)

0
...
86)

−0
...
20)

Organization employs 1,000+ employees

0
...
39)*

0
...
78)

0
...
20)*
0
...
04)

Number of employees at workplace (ref
...
055 (0
...
986 (1
...
196 (1
...
601 (1
...
184 (1
...
297 (2
...
864 (1
...
207 (1
...
027 (0
...
604 (1
...
114 (0
...
: Manufacturing)
Construction

−0
...
90)

−0
...
48)

−0
...
06)

Transport and Communication

−0
...
65)

0
...
15)

−0
...
09)

Wholesale/Retail

−0
...
88)

0
...
69)

−0
...
11)

Finance/Insurance/Real estate

0
...
13)

−0
...
13)

0
...
20)

Health

0
...
49)

0
...
98)

0
...
27)

Business services

0
...
18)

0
...
65)

−0
...
08)

Educational and social services

−0
...
40)

−0
...
76)

−0
...
33)

Other industries

−0
...
86)

0
...
34)

−0
...
08)

Profit sharing bonuses

−0
...
45)

0
...
01)

−0
...
37)*

Employee stock ownership/ESOP

−0
...
23)*

−0
...
32)

−0
...
77)
−0
...
51)

Bonuses for meeting workplace goals

−0
...
02)*

−0
...
70)

Human resources department

0
...
95)

0
...
92)

0
...
40)

Open door policy

−1
...
46)**

−1
...
94)**

−1
...
38)**

Grievance procedure

−0
...
89)

0
...
88)

−0
...
41)*

Joint committee of managers and employees

−0
...
00)**

−0
...
06)

−0
...
06)**

Constant

3
...
46)**

1
...
43)

3
...
03)**

Observations

2,049

282

1,767

R-sq

0
...
29

0
...
* significant at a 95 % CI
...
(The full
models are available on request)
...
Controlling for other factors,
those who perceive more poor working conditions have a greater likelihood of voting
for a union
...
041

−0
...
050

(7
...
29)

(8
...
25

0
...
14

Poor working conditions

(1) Unweighted OLS estimating whether would vote for a union if election held today
(2) Independent variables are as per Table 5
(3) T-statistics in parentheses
...
** significant at a 99 % CI

voting for the union is driven by non-members
...
15
There is a vast literature in the United States on employers’ ability to reduce
worker support for unions by implementing HR policies that substitute for unions as a
solution to their problems and needs at work (Fiorito 2001)
...
Entered separately into the union voting models they appear to
be weakly associated with a lower propensity to vote for the union among nonmembers
...
This link between HR policies and non-members’ propensity to
vote union is stronger when worker perceptions of poor conditions are excluded from
the model: when poor conditions are excluded HR policies are jointly statistically
significant at a 99 percent confidence level with open door policies (−
...
41) and
work committees (−
...
41) both being negatively correlated with voting union
...
HR policies are not associated with
members’ voting intentions whether controlling for poor working conditions or not
...
One potential reason why this might have occurred is that, in
general, there have been substantial improvements in working conditions
...
This paper therefore sought to bring together these two issues of working
15

As in the British case, the number of poor working conditions was significantly positively correlated
with voting union conditioning on job dissatisfaction
...
We began by establishing how
workers perceived working conditions in Britain and the United States towards the
end of the 20th Century
...
Because our surveys were not comparable, our measures of poor working conditions differed somewhat across the three data
sets we used, but we found that the distribution of perceived poor working conditions
looked similar in all three cases
...
We then switched to the issue of
worker desire for union representation
...
Furthermore, in both the
United States and Britain, the number of poor working conditions an individual
perceived at her workplace was strongly correlated with their desire for union
representation having controlled for demographic, job and workplace characteristics
...
There is a substantial literature
showing that poor conditions at work trigger union organizing and increase the likelihood that a worker will join their workplace union
...
That desire has not been
assuaged by employer practices which aim to involve employees and manufacture
non-union forms of communication
...
Thus the gap between what workers want and what
they get in terms of workplace representation remains an important issue for public
policy, albeit one that is currently receiving very little attention
...
Traditionally, analysts have
contented themselves with a single measure, such as an overall job satisfaction
measure or perception of the climate of employment relations
...
First, any single item will only capture
a part of an underlying multi-dimensional concept such as poor conditions at work
...

Second, there is no reason, a priori, why one should give precedence to one facet
of poor conditions
...
For instance, workers may be
less likely to cite problems with pay satisfaction when the labor market is tight and
employers are having to meet fairly large wage demands to attract and retain workers
...
Another big advantage of a multi-item scale
scored as a fraction of the total possible number of poor conditions recorded is that it
offers a possibility of making comparisons across surveys where the specific survey
questions are not identical
...
We were constrained in the items available to us
since the surveys had already been undertaken
...
We
identified the cut off for “poor” conditions in the way described below
...
One might
consider giving greater weight to some items than others in an additive scale, but
there were no a priori reasons for doing so
...
The
Cronbach alpha for all items in the BWRPS was
...
64
...
Consequently, whereas one can readily add up scores to similar questions to form a scale,
principal components analyses would have to be run on the sub-samples asked the
same set of questions
...
All items in
Appendix Table 1 are 0–1 dummy variables apart from the last one, which is an
“influence gap” running from 0–3
...
deciding how to do your job and
organise work; setting working hours including breaks, overtime and time off;
deciding how much of a pay rise the people in your work group or department should
get; the pace at which you work; deciding how to work with new equipment or
software; deciding what kinds of perks and bonuses are offered to employees”
...
For the same items
respondents are then asked “tell me how important it would be to you to have a lot of
influence over…” with responses coded on a four point scale from “very important”
to “not at all important”
...
Because respondents are randomly split into two groups, both of whom
answer only three of the six items, respondents can score between 0–3 on the
influence gap scale
...
The influence gap is constructed in a similar fashion, too, with 1 point
added to the scale every time a person views having a lot of influence as ‘very
important’ but does not have a lot of influence up to a maximum of 4
...


J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

23

Table 7 BWRPS perceptions of poor working conditions
BWRPS, 2001, 0–23 score

Mean (sd)

- Workers paid unfair wages


...
38)

- Workers dismissed/disciplined unfairly


...
28)

- Bullying by management/fellow workers


...
28)

- Sexual or racial discrimination


...
16)

- Preferential treatment by management


...
38)

- Have witnessed or experienced unfair treatment at current workplace


...
42)

- Disagree managers understanding about having to meet family responsibilities


...
35)

- Disagree people encouraged to develop skills


...
36)

- Management poor at giving fair pay increases


...
44)

- Management poor at making work enjoyable


...
34)

- Management poor at willingness to share power


...
41)

- Management poor at concern for employees


...
36)

- Management poor at keeping everyone up to date with proposed changes


...
40)

- Management poor at understanding and knowledge of the business


...
27)

- Management poor at promoting equal ops


...
25)

- Do not trust employer to keep promises at all


...
29)

- Disagree that ‘my job is secure’


...
34)

- Disagree that ‘my job is interesting and enjoyable’


...
34)

- ‘Relations between employees and management’ are ‘poor’


...
29)

- Not satisfied with influence in company decisions affecting you


...
45)

- Influence gap


...
83)

Table 8 WERS perceptions of poor working conditions
WERS, 1998, 0–13 score

Mean (sd)

- Job insecure


...
40)

- Dissatisfied with influence over job


...
36)

- Dissatisfied with pay


...
49)

- Dissatisfied with sense of achievement


...
35)

- Dissatisfied with respect from supervisors


...
40)

- Disagree managers understanding about having to meet family responsibilities


...
39)

- Disagree people encouraged to develop skills


...
42)

- Management poor at keeping everyone up to date about proposed changes


...
45)

- Management poor on providing everyone with the chance to comment on proposed changes’


...
48)

- Management poor in responding to suggestions


...
46)

- Management poor dealing with work problems


...
42)

- Management poor at ‘treating employees fairly’


...
40)

- Relations between management and employees poor or very poor


...
38)

24

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

Table 9 BWRPS perceptions of poor working conditions
WRPS, 1995, 0–13 score

Mean
(sd)

- Don’t trust management ‘at all’ to keep promises


...
20)

- Relations between employees and management poor


...
23)

- Relations between employees and management worse than average


...
30)

- Not at all satisfied with influence in company decisions affecting job or work life


...
28)

- Not at all likely to get influence you want if you tried


...
27)

- Management never take suggestions seriously


...
21)

- Have held back from making suggestions about how to work more efficiently through fear of
...
37)
own or someone else’s job
- System for resolving problems of individual employees is ‘not effective at all’


...
23)

- ‘Town’ meetings not effective at all in resolving group problems


...
15)

- Open door policy not effective at all in resolving group problems


...
12)

- Employee committee not effective at all in resolving group problems


...
10)

- Influence gap


...
06)

Table 10 Descriptive data
All

Member

Non-member

a) WERS
Desire for union representation (0,3)

1
...
18)

Union member

0
...
49)

Female

0
...
50)

1
...
03)
1
0
...
50)

0
...
87)
0
0
...
50)

Age
Under 25

0
...
31)

0
...
20)

0
...
37)

25–29

0
...
34)

0
...
31)

0
...
35)

30–39

0
...
45)

0
...
46)

0
...
44)

40–49

0
...
44)

0
...
47)

0
...
41)

50–59

0
...
39)

0
...
40)

0
...
38)

60+

0
...
19)

0
...
17)

0
...
19)

Non-white

0
...
19)

0
...
19)

0
...
19)

Health problem

0
...
23)

0
...
25)

0
...
21)

Married or living as married

0
...
46)

0
...
43)

0
...
47)

None

0
...
41)

0
...
42)

0
...
41)

CSE or equivalent

0
...
31)

0
...
30)

0
...
32)

GCSE or equivalent

0
...
44)

0
...
43)

0
...
45)

Qualifications

A level or equivalent

0
...
37)

0
...
36)

0
...
37)

Degree of equivalent

0
...
39)

0
...
40)

0
...
37)

Post-grad degree or equivalent

0
...
25)

0
...
27)

0
...
23)

Any vocational qualifications

0
...
48)

0
...
49)

0
...
48)

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

25

Table 10 (continued)
All

Member

Non-member

Occupation
Manager

0
...
31)

0
...
27)

Professional

0
...
35)

0
...
40)

0
...
34)
0
...
31)

Associate professional

0
...
28)

0
...
30)

0
...
27)

Clerical

0
...
42)

0
...
40)

0
...
43)

Craft

0
...
27)

0
...
31)

0
...
25)

Personal

0
...
31)

0
...
30)

0
...
31)

Sales

0
...
26)

0
...
18)

0
...
30)

Operative

0
...
28)

0
...
32)

0
...
26)

Other occupation

0
...
27)

0
...
26)

0
...
28)

< 2 years

0
...
45)

0
...
37)

0
...
48)

2–4 years

0
...
42)

0
...
40)

0
...
43)

5–9 years

0
...
42)

0
...
43)

0
...
41)

10+ years

0
...
44)

0
...
49)

0
...
38)

Under 10

0
...
18)

0
...
10)

0
...
21)

10–29

0
...
37)

0
...
32)

0
...
40)

Tenure at workplace

Usual hours worked per week

30–39

0
...
48)

0
...
49)

0
...
46)

40–47

0
...
45)

0
...
46)

0
...
45)

48+

0
...
37)

0
...
37)

0
...
37)

Gender segregation in job at workplace
Only men

0
...
35)

0
...
37)

0
...
33)

Mainly men

0
...
40)

0
...
41)

0
...
39)

Equal

0
...
47)

0
...
47)

0
...
47)

Mainly women

0
...
44)

0
...
43)

0
...
45)

Only women

0
...
26)

0
...
0
...
09 (0
...
05 (0
...
01 (0
...
08 (0
...
05 (0
...
02 (0
...
07 (0
...
11 (0
...
07 (0
...
14 (0
...
09 (0
...
07 (0
...
10 (0
...
11 (0
...
11 (0
...
11 (0
...
11 (0
...
12 (0
...
10 (0
...
11 (0
...
13 (0
...
09 (0
...
09 (0
...
11 (0
...
07 (0
...
10 (0
...
15 (0
...
08 (0
...
09 (0
...
11 (0
...
07 (0
...
05 (0
...
05 (0
...
04 (0
...
04 (0
...
03 (0
...
05 (0
...
93 (0
...
96 (0
...
91 (0
...
60 (0
...
91 (0
...
30, 9
...
81 (1
...
09 (1
...
62 (1
...
67 (12
...
43 (13
...
78 (11
...
62 (0
...
76 (0
...
52 (0
...
14 (0
...
14 (0
...
15 (0
...
04 (0
...
08 (0
...
02 (0
...
05 (0
...
04 (0
...
05 (0
...
13 (0
...
05 (0
...
18 (0
...
04 (0
...
01 (0
...
06 (0
...
06 (0
...
09 (0
...
04 (0
...
06 (0
...
06 (0
...
05 (0
...
09 (0
...
03 (0
...
14 (0
...
10 (0
...
17 (0
...
06 (0
...
12 (0
...
16 (0
...
10 (0
...
12 (0
...
14 (0
...
10 (0
...
04 (0
...
04 (0
...
05 (0
...
45 (0
...
49 (0
...
43 (0
...
96 (0
...
99 (0
...
94 (0
...
43 (0
...
53 (0
...
36 (0
...
39 (0
...
41 (0
...
38 (0
...
50 (0
...
55 (0
...
47 (0
...
20 (1
...
29 (0
...
15 (1
...
24 (0
...
23 (0
...
24 (0
...
26 (0
...
27 (0
...
26 (0
...
38 (0
...
89 (0
...
30 (0
...
14 (0
...
53 (0
...
30, 91
...
40 (0
...
73 (0
...
50 (0
...
17 (0
...
08 (0
...
18 (0
...
30 (0
...
22 (0
...
31 (0
...
28 (0
...
37 (0
...
26 (0
...
16 (0
...
22 (0
...
15 (0
...
08 (0
...
10 (0
...
08 (0
...
14 (0
...
12 (0
...
15 (0
...
58 (0
...
66 (0
...
57 (0
...
55 (0
...
49 (0
...
56 (0
...
43 (0
...
57 (0
...
41 (0
...
32 (0
...
30 (0
...
33 (0
...
25 (0
...
12 (0
...
27 (0
...
00 (0
...
01 (0
...
00 (0
...
04 (0
...
02 (0
...
05 (0
...
21 (0
...
10 (0
...
23 (0
...
19 (0
...
08 (0
...
21 (0
...
11 (0
...
08 (0
...
12 (0
...
09 (0
...
07 (0
...
10 (0
...
10 (0
...
21 (0
...
09 (0
...
10 (0
...
17 (0
...
09 (0
...
36 (0
...
29 (0
...
38 (0
...
27 (0
...
09 (0
...
29 (0
...
24 (0
...
18 (0
...
25 (0
...
22 (0
...
19 (0
...
22 (0
...
28 (0
...
54 (0
...
24 (0
...
09 (0
...
02 (0
...
10 (0
...
54 (0
...
60 (0
...
53 (0
...
37 (0
...
38 (0
...
37 (0
...
06 (0
...
02 (0
...
07 (0
...
09 (0
...
04 (0
...
10 (0
...
08 (0
...
04 (0
...
08 (0
...
08 (0
...
04 (0
...
08 (0
...
08 (0
...
06 (0
...
08 (0
...
07 (0
...
06 (0
...
07 (0
...
05 (0
...
05 (0
...
05 (0
...
11 (0
...
17 (0
...
10 (0
...
08 (0
...
15 (0
...
06 (0
...
08 (0
...
14 (0
...
06 (0
...
08 (0
...
11 (0
...
07 (0
...
17 (0
...
11 (0
...
18 (0
...
44 (0
...
60 (0
...
42 (0
...
20 (0
...
10 (0
...
22 (0
...
30 (0
...
24 (0
...
31 (0
...
28 (0
...
31 (0
...
27 (0
...
20 (0
...
34 (0
...
19 (0
...
01 (0
...
01 (0
...
01 (0
...
27 (0
...
39 (0
...
25 (0
...
04 (0
...
07 (0
...
04 (0
...
09 (0
...
17 (0
...
07 (0
...
21 (0
...
13 (0
...
22 (0
...
08 (0
...
03 (0
...
09 (0
...
10 (0
...
03 (0
...
11 (0
...
07 (0
...
05 (0
...
08 (0
...
05 (0
...
04 (0
...
05 (0
...
09 (0
...
09 (0
...
09 (0
...
28 (0
...
18 (0
...
29 (0
...
22 (0
...
24 (0
...
22 (0
...
24 (0
...
18 (0
...
25 (0
...
69 (0
...
74 (0
...
68 (0
...
84 (0
...
79 (0
...
84 (0
...
31 (0
...
81 (0
...
23 (0
...
37 (0
...
60 (0
...
34 (0
...
22 (0
...
09

mean values with standard deviation in parentheses
...
National Centre for Social Research, London
Brown A, Charlwood A, Forde C and Spencer D (2006) “Changing job quality in Great Britain, 19982004”, Department for Business, Skills and Innovation, Employment Relations Series No
...
Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics 72(3):357–380
Budd J (2004) Employment with a human face: balancing efficiency, equity and voice
...
lse
...
uk/seminarpapers/
WB-11-05-11GREEN
...
Routledge, London
Diamond W, Freeman RB (2002) What workers want from workplace organisations
...
E
...
eurofound
...

eu/pubdocs/2010/74/en/3/EF1074EN
...
4216

J Labor Res (2013) 34:1–29

29

Fiorito J (2001) Human resource management practices and worker desires for union representation
...
American Economic Review 68:135–141
Freeman RB and Medoff J (1984) What Do Unions Do, Basic Books
Freeman RB, Rogers J (1999) What workers want
...
Cornell University Press, Ithaca
Goldberg D, Williams PA (1998) User guide to the general health questionnaire
...
The paradox of job quality in the affluent society
...
In: Lorsch J (ed) Handbook of organizational behavior
...
Journal of Labor Research, XXVI 2:241–266
Kaufman B (2010) The theoretical foundation of industrial relations and its implications for labor
economics and human resource management
...
Routledge
Klandermans B (1986) Psychology and trade union participation: joining, acting, quitting
...
Verlag von Otto Meisner
Maslow AH (1943) A theory of human motivation
...

Oxford University Press
Townsend P (1979) Poverty in the United Kingdom: a survey of household resources and standards of
living
...
V
...
However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use

---