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Trade Union Concentration and the Determination of Wages: The Case of Teachers in England and Wales
Author(s) -
Dolton Peter,
Robson Martin
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
british journal of industrial relations
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.665
H-Index - 70
eISSN - 1467-8543
pISSN - 0007-1080
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8543.1996.tb00489.x
Subject(s) - negotiation , wage , index (typography) , union density , value (mathematics) , trade union , economics , labour economics , industrial relations , demographic economics , political science , law , statistics , management , mathematics , world wide web , computer science
Multi‐unionism is a common feature of the industrial relations scene, yet to date there has been relatively little economic analysis of its effects, in particular on the outcome of wage negotiations. In this paper, we examine the impact of multi‐unionism—specifically, the degree of union membership concentration—on the determination of the relative pay of a particular occupational group, namely that of schoolteachers in England and Wales. We measure teacher trade union concentration using the Herfindahl index of concentration, and find that, after controlling for other possible influences, changes in the value of this index have a positive impact on schoolteachers' relative pay. In addition, we find union membership concentration to be a better indicator of ‘union pushfulness’ effects in wage determination than the traditional measure, union density. These findings are potentially of wider significance for the analysis of wage determination in multi‐union environments.