Independent External Monitoring Agricultural Report 2014 Syngenta, Hungary Sunflower

This document is part of a digital collection provided by the Martin P. Catherwood Library, ILR School, Cornell University, pertaining to the effects of globalization on the workplace worldwide. Special emphasis is placed on labor rights, working conditions, labor market changes, and union organizing.FLA_2014_Syngenta_Hungary_Sunflower.pdf: 16 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Seniority Rules and the Gains from Union Organization

This paper examines the optimality of several seniority provisions which are common to U.S. union contracts. The paper focuses on the attempts by the initial union members to maximize their return from organizing the union. An overlapping generations model is used in the analysis. Seniority wage increases are found to serve as implicit initiation fees and thus serve as one means of appropriating rents from future union members. Layoff rules are shown to be optimal only when the organizers are constrained in the types of contracts they can write. Without these constraints, the optimal contract provides full insurance making layoff rules unnecessary. The paper concludes with a plausible set of constraints which organizers may face and discusses the conditions necessary for seniority layoff rules to result.

Organizing for Safe Work in a Safe World

[Excerpt] Health and safety is a promising issue for organizing workers, whether as new members or in revitalizing local unions. Working conditions have dramatically deteriorated over the past decade, and millions of workers now work in workplaces that are unbelievably dangerous and unhealthy. There are many different organizing strategies. The authors start from the premise that from day one the goal of any organizing campaign is union building. Recognizing that there are different ways to get there, and that resources and circumstances differ from campaign to campaign, we attempt in this article to outline the basic ingredients and a general strategic approach. While our focus here is on organizing new members, the general approach we outline is equally effective for union building in already constituted local unions

The Impact of the Runaway Office on Union Certification Elections in Clerical Units

The law prohibits firms from moving work to avoid unionization. Still, many employees fear that joining a union may cost them their jobs. This paper assesses the impact of that fear on how clerical workers vote in union certification elections. Two data sets were collected and analyzed for this purpose, and three measures of the firms' ability to relocate office work were developed. Clerical workers in offices that were judged to be easier to relocate were found to be more likely to report that the fear of job loss was important to their voting decision. Those who voted against the union were most likely to report that the fear that they would lose their jobs was a significant consideration. Further, workers in units judged to be most easily relocated were found to have a 7 to 30% lower probability of voting union than those who were in less mobile jobs.

Labor Bookshelf

[Excerpt] Steel and auto. These are the basics of American basic industry, and the United Steelworkers and United Autoworkers, representing workers in these industries, have been at the very core of the American labor movement. For most of the years since World War II, the membership of these two unions has constituted something like one -seventh of the organized workforce, and the USW and UAW pioneered many of the innovations in collective bargaining that all unions now take for granted

Market Campaigns : implications for Ford Motor Company

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96948/1/MBA_Vernonf_2001Final.pd

Organizing High Tech: Unions & Their Future

[Excerpt] Statistics compiled by the American Electronics Association—a leading defender of high tech\u27s union-free environment\u27—indicate the difficulty unions have had organizing electronics workers. The AEA surveyed almost 1,200 firms about union activity in their plants between 1971 and 1982. They reported fewer than 100 NLRB representation elections during that period, with unions winning only 21. These figures understate labor\u27s problem. Through a sophisticated mixture of paternalism and repression, the high tech industry has prevented the vast majority of employee organizing efforts from reaching the stage of a Labor Board election. As a result, the AEA\u27s 1900 member companies have only 90 union contracts. In this article, we will examine the job problems facing high tech workers, the factors inhibiting union organizing in their industry, the experiences of some recent high tech campaigns, and strategies for overcoming the obstacles to worker self-organization in this crucial sector of the U.S. economy

Are Trojan Horse Union Organizers Employees ?: A New Look at Deference to the NLRB\u27s Iterpretation of NLRA Section 2(3)

This Note takes a different approach to interpreting section 2(3). Although this Note agrees that section 2(3) neither clearly includes nor clearly excludes trojan horse organizers, it also argues that the definition of employee under section 2(3) must be determined by looking to common law principles of agency. In other words, the question whether courts should defer to the Board\u27s interpretation of section 2(3) does not turn on statutory ambiguity. Rather, courts have a continuing duty to ensure that the Board interprets employee consistently with common law agency principles. Nevertheless, the correct interpretation of employee under agency principles ultimately turns on an empirical judgment about whether trojan horse organizers generally work as hard as other employees. This judgment is uniquely suited to the NLRB, whose experience and expertise with the complexities of industrial relations the Court has consistently recognized. This Note therefore concludes that courts should defer to Board orders protecting trojan horse organizers, not on the basis of statutory ambiguity, but because the Board is best equipped to make the judgments necessary to reach the proper legal conclusion under the principles of agency

Competitiveness Of The Croatian Exhibition Industry And The Impact Of The Economic Crisis

The recession has conquered the world exhibition industry. Croatia was not spared either. Since the exhibition industry is strongly correlated with the economic situation in industry sectors, and the economic recovery is going slow, a lot of time seems to remain for the struggle to keep the fair business afloat. The article analyses and researches the global exhibition industry trends, the trade fair and exhibition industry in Croatia, its quality and the scope of influence, core competences, advantages of employing the strategic management model for professional fair operating companies and the possibility for the industry to achieve competitive advantage. The conducted empirical research reveals to what extent the strategic level linked to the project management contributes to better performing and achieving the business excellence in this industry. Additionally, some new business models and tools are being proposed and evaluated to be used for reducing the damage not only in TF&E industry, but in various kinds of service industries in Croatia, such as CEM