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Despite declining bargaining power, unions continue to generate a wage premium. Some feel collective bargaining has had its day. Politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have recently called for the removal of bargaining rights from workers in the name of wage and employment flexibility, yet unions often work in tandem with employers for mutual gain based on productivity growth. If this is where the premium originates, then firms and workers benefit. Without unions bargaining successfully to raise worker wages, income inequality would almost certainly be higher than it is.

I estimate the effects of trade unions on employee and employer perceptions of workplace management-employee relations in Britain using linked employer-employee data from the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Associations between these relations and unionization vary with institutional arrangements in relation to bargaining and lay representation. There is support for McCarthy's view that union lay representatives can act as a 'lubricant' assisting with employment relations, but this is apparent from an employer perspective, not an employee perspective. The only union effect common across employers and employees is poorer perceptions of employment relations where union coverage is at the level known to generate a union wage premium.

AbstractThis paper uses the 1990–1998 Workplace Industrial Relations Survey Panel to analyse the impact of unions on employment growth among private sector workplaces in Britain. The growth rate among unionised workplaces was roughly 3–4% per annum lower than among non‐unionised workplaces, ceteris paribus. The effect is not accounted for by the age of unionised workplaces, union concentration in declining industries, or organisational or technical change at workplace level. The effect remains once we account for the impact of unions on workplace survival. However, effects are only apparent where unions do not negotiate over employment and where unions have some degree of bargaining strength.

This paper uses the 1990-1998 Workplace Industrial Relations Survey Panel to analyze the impact of unions on employment growth among private sector workplaces in Britain. The growth rate among unionized workplaces was roughly 3%-4% per annum lower than among non-unionized workplaces, ceteris paribus. The effect is not accounted for by the age of unionized workplaces, union concentration in declining industries, or organizational or technical change at workplace level. The effect remains once we account for the impact of unions on workplace survival. However, effects are only apparent where unions do not negotiate over employment & where unions have some degree of bargaining strength. 4 Tables, 1 Appendix, 37 References. Adapted from the source document.

A new welfare-to-work regime is emerging in Britain, one that expects most working-age benefit claimants to be work-focused. Jobcentre Plus delivers the policy, using a range of welfare-to-work tools that reflect the complex underlying causes of unemployment. Many date back some years, but developments such as the introduction of a minimum wage, the New Deals and tax credits, mark a new departure. The successful delivery of this raft of programmes and policy interventions requires considerable organisational change. This article considers whether or not the government is on the right track.

This article addresses the question: what impact do trade unions have on employee trust in management? Using nationally representative data on employees in theBritish Social Attitudes Survey(BSAS) 1998, we assess associations between measures of unionisation and employee perceptions that managers usually keep their promises to employees. The article provides broad support for the three hypotheses explored here. First, employee trust in managers is higher where there is a balance of power between unions and management at the workplace. Secondly, employees' trust in managers is higher where management supports union membership, and is lowest where management actively discourages membership. This is equally true among employees in unionised and non-unionised workplaces. Thirdly, employees' perceptions of union effectiveness are positively associated with higher trust in management.The positive association between managerial support for union membership and employee trust in management can be interpreted in various ways. But the finding suggests that management can influence employee perceptions of them for better or for worse through their engagement with unions.Management can also foster a high trust relationship with employees by ensuring that unions have sufficient power to make a positive contribution to the running of the workplace, since unions with the 'right amount of power' are associated with higher trust in management. Weak unions are particularly bad for employee perceptions of management, raising the question why employers often recognise unions for pay bargaining, but preside over a decline in union strength at the workplace.Unions are best able to create a climate in which employees trust management where they are perceived to be doing their job well, where they have regard to union members' problems and complaints, and where they contribute to the smooth running of the workplace. In these circumstances, trust in management is generally no different from that found among employees in non-unionised workplaces. However, where unions are viewed as ineffective, trust in management is lower than in comparable non-unionised workplaces.

The author examines the relationship between employee involvement (EI) and small firms' financial performance using statistical analyses of establishment-level data from the 1990 Workplace Industrial Relations Survey. The author finds EI practices and EI combinations which 'work' for small-firm establishments are very different from those that work for large-firm establishments. The least bureaucratic and least costly EI methods have the potential to benefit small firms most. Whether they actually do so depends on the array of other EI and non-EI practices in operation: an inappropriate configuration can have a negative effect on performance. The findings take account of factors associated with being an 'EI firm'.

With the financial crisis and Great Recession, some economists have begun to question the orthodox approach to production and capital/labor relations over the last two to three decades. This orthodoxy has been thrown into question due to concerns of poor corporate decision-making, corporate capture of regulators, perceived rewards for failure, and uneven productivity growth. But a new spirit of introspection and doubt about orthodox approaches has created some impetus leading to greater interest in themes, such as worker ownership, sharing rewards, co-operatives, and employee involvement practices which feature heavily in the Advances series. This "new spirit" is apparent for all to see in the 12 contributions to this volume of Advances which cover co-operatives; effects of worker participation on firm performance; the diffusion of high involvement management practices; and outcomes for workers (i.e., job satisfaction and wages).