Intensity of management resistance: understanding the decline of unionization in the private sector

IX. Conclusions Although Lipset and Katchanovski present many of the major societal and structural causes that have influenced the decline of private sector unions, they have unfortunately omitted a factor that can account for as much as 40 percent of the decline in private sector union membership, i.e., intensity of management opposition. The managerial incentives to stop unionization are formidable because unions raise wages and reduce profits. Economic reasons for American managers to stop unionization have grown as the wage between union and nonunion workers has widened over the past 40 years especially relative to EU nations. In addition, as managerial accountability to shareholders has risen and pay related to performance has grown, top executives have attempted to raise productivity through high-performance workplace practices or lowering real wages. Since many of these practices rely on top-level executives being able to make decisions on personnel quickly without challenges from employees or due process, they have fought unions more vigorously in order to maintain this discretion over workplace decisions. Although this behavior by management may result in a more efficient allocation of resources from both a micro-and macroeconomic perspective, the losses to society occur in terms of greater income inequality and less employee voice at the workplace and in the political arena.