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In an earlier article, I discussed and examined the odd morphing of California's state budget crisis of the early 2000s into a fight between Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger with public‐sector unions over a series of ballot initiatives. By making an enemy of the labor movement, the governor provoked a massive campaign against his initiatives. Below I describe a different strategy taken by the governor in the context of the California budget crisis of 2008–2009.

Current debates over "saving social security" may fuel future disruptive social movements of elderly baby boomers. Such elderly movements appeared in the 1930s and 1940s in California. Political entrepreneurs of that era turned these movements into profitable schemes with major repercussions.

A wave of union concessions to management has attracted substantial interest in the private sector. However, little attention has been paid to this phenomenon in public employment. Various reasons can be cited which could encourage or discourage the same kinds of concessions in government. The empirical evidence suggests that while concession bargaining has occurred in government, it has been less extensive than in the private sector and has been concentrated in a few states. Where it has occurred, the background has been similar to the private sector, namely economic distress and threatened or actual mass layoffs. But public sector concession bargaining does not appear to mark a fundamental change in collective bargaining.

Abstract:How can employers worldwide be experiencing increasingly severe labour shortages in the face of globalization? Why don't wages rise in expanding economies? This article argues that declining union power has allowed employers to take the upper hand, setting pay and other conditions of employment as they would in a monopsonistic labour market. Rejecting the perfect competition model matching supply to demand, the authors argue that, far from being a pedagogical curiosity, monopsony's imbalance in bargaining power is widespread. Employee voice needs to be restored to counter the undesirable consequences of strong macroeconomic performance, such as wage inequality and reduced worker rights.

Resumen.¿Cómo es posible que, en todas las partes del mundo, en plena globalización, los empleadores sufran problemas cada vez más graves de escasez de mano de obra?¿Por qué no suben los salarios en las economías en expansión? La tesis que se defiende en este artículo es que, debido a la pérdida de fuerza de los sindicatos, los empleadores han tomado la delantera y establecen los salarios y otras condiciones de trabajo conforme a las reglas de un mercado laboral monopsonista. Los autores refutan el modelo de competencia perfecta, con su equilibrio entre oferta y demanda, y sostienen que, lejos de ser una curiosidad pedagógica, el monopsonismo y su desequilibrio en cuanto a la capacidad de negociación son una realidad muy extendida. Es necesario devolver la palabra a los trabajadores para subsanar consecuencias tan indeseables de los éxitos macroeconómicos como la desigualdad de ingresos y la pérdida de derechos laborales.