Factors of convergence and divergence in union membership

This paper considers to what extent union decline in Britain has been characterised by convergence or divergence in union membership rates for people with different personal and job characteristics. It compares data on individual union membership in 1975, from a period when union membership was high and growing, to data in 2001 data when it is low and has been falling for over twenty years. Some factors of both convergence and divergence are identified. The clearest individual characteristic of convergence is gender. In 1975 there was a big male-female gap in union membership, whilst by 2001 one cannot reject the hypothesis that union membership rates were equal for men and women. The clearest case of divergence is age where the 1975-2001 period sees a widening of the age gap in union membership status. Other factors of convergence are the full- time/part-time status of jobs, ethnicity and workplace size. Other factors of divergence are industry and educational qualifications. Some other factors (like region) are neutral in that their relationship with union membership remains stable through time. Identification of these factors of convergence and divergence should be useful to many parties, including industrial relations scholars and union organisers. Finally, the fact that the magnitude of the relationships between union membership and a number of its determinants have shifted through time illustrates that one should be careful if one wishes to talk about empirical regularities in who is more or less likely to become a trade union member

Union Decline in Britain

In this paper I consider the rapid decline in the unionization rate that has occurred in Britain since the late 1970s. An establishment based analysis reports that the overwhelming factor in explaining falling unionization was a failure to organise the new sorts of establishments that were set up in the last twenty years or so. Patterns showing low rates of union recognition and density in new establishments set up in the 1980s and 1990s are seen to be very similar for new workplaces in both decades, reflecting that the developments since 1990 represent a continuation of the pattern revealed in earlier work for the 1980-90 period. The sharpest falls in unionization occurred in private manufacturing establishments set up post-1980, with significant falls also occurring, but from a lower initial level, in private sector services. In the public sector there is no establishment age based decline in recognition. Finally, there is some evidence that age of workplace, rather than age of worker, is the critical age based factor. This seems to be the case as the negative association between unionization and the post-1980 set up of the establishment is found to hold for workers of all ages.Union recognition, union density, establishment age

In brief: Economic Inequality in the UK

Stephen Machin, a member of the National Equality Panel, summarises its recent report

Factors of Convergence and Divergence in Union Membership

This paper considers to what extent union decline in Britain has been characterised by convergence or divergence in union membership rates for people with different personal and job characteristics. It compares data on individual union membership in 1975, from a period when union membership was high and growing, to data in 2001 data when it is low and has been falling for over twenty years. Some factors of both convergence and divergence are identified. The clearest individual characteristic of convergence is gender. In 1975 there was a big male-female gap in union membership, whilst by 2001 one cannot reject the hypothesis that union membership rates were equal for men and women. The clearest case of divergence is age where the 1975-2001 period sees a widening of the age gap in union membership status. Other factors of convergence are the full- time/part-time status of jobs, ethnicity and workplace size. Other factors of divergence are industry and educational qualifications. Some other factors (like region) are neutral in that their relationship with union membership remains stable through time. Identification of these factors of convergence and divergence should be useful to many parties, including industrial relations scholars and union organisers. Finally, the fact that the magnitude of the relationships between union membership and a number of its determinants have shifted through time illustrates that one should be careful if one wishes to talk about empirical regularities in who is more or less likely to become a trade union member.

Looking for HRM/Union Substitution: Evidence from British Workplaces

In this paper we test the HRM/union substitution hypothesis that human resource management (HRM) practices act as a substitute for unionization. We use British workplace data between 1980 and 1998 which allows us toexamine for the first time whether increased HRM incidence has coincided with union decline.First, we compare changes over time in the incidence of HRM practices across union and non-union sectors, finding little cross-time difference occurring between sectors. Second, we ask whether newer workplaces (strongly shown by other research as more likely to be non-union) have experienced differentiallyfaster HRM incidence; we are unable to find much evidence in support of this. Third, longitudinal changes alsofail to pick up any evidence of faster union decline in workplaces or industries with faster take up of HRMpractices. We find no evidence of HRM substitution operating in the hypothesised way of it replacing unions and conclude that increased HRM incidence does not seem to be an important factor underpinning union decline in Britain.Human Resource Management, Trade unions

Crime and police resources: the street crime initiative

In this paper we look at links between police resources and crime in a different way to the existing economics of crime work. To do so we focus on a policy intervention - the Street Crime Initiative - that was introduced in England and Wales in 2002. This allocated additional resources to some police force areas to combat street crime, whereas other forces did not receive any additional funding. Estimates derived from several empirical strategies show that robberies did fall significantly in SCI police forces relative to non-SCI forces after the initiative was introduced. Moreover, the policy seems to have been a cost effective one. There is some heterogeneity in this positive net social benefit across different SCI police forces, suggesting that some police forces may have made better use of the extra resources than others. Overall, we reach the conclusion that increased police resources do in fact lead to lower crime, at least in the context of the SCI programme we study

Spatial crime patterns and the introduction of the UK minimum wage

In this paper we consider the connection between crime and the labour market in a different way to existing work. We focus on a situation where the introduction of a minimum wage floor to a labour market previously unregulated by minimum wage legislation provided substantial pay increases for low paid workers. From a theoretical perspective we argue that this wage boost has the potential to alter peoples’ incentives to participate in crime. We formulate empirical tests, based upon area-level data in England and Wales, which look at what happened to crime rates before and after the introduction of the national minimum wage to the UK labour market in April 1999. Comparing police force area-level crime rates before and after the minimum wage introduction produces evidence in line with the notion that changing economic incentives for low wage workers can influence crime

Academy schools under Labour combated disadvantage and increased pupil achievement: the coalition’s new policy may exacerbate existing inequalities

With the recent accusation that Michael Gove has been sending ‘mixed messages’ over academy schools, it is clear that the policy is still very controversial. Stephen Machin and James Vernoit take a step back and compare the academy schools created by Labour with the new ‘coalition academies’ that have either opened this autumn or applied for academy status since May, and finds the latter are likely to reinforce advantage and exacerbate existing inequalitie

The Causes and Consequences of Long-Term Unemployment in Europe

One of the most striking features of European labour markets is the high incidence of long-term unemployment. In this paper we review the literature on its causes and consequences. Our main conclusions are that: the rise in the incidence of long-term unemployment has been 'caused' by a collapse of outflow rates at all durations of unemployment while the long-term unemployed do leave unemployment at a slower rate than the short-term unemployed, this has always been the case and their relative outflow rate has not fallen over time there is no evidence that, for a given level of unemployment, the incidence of long-term unemployment has been ratcheting up over time once one controls for heterogeneity of the unemployed, there is little evidence of outflow rates that decline over a spell of unemployment While these findings suggest that long-term unemployment is not a problem independent of unemployment itself, one should recognise that the experience of long-term unemployment is a horrid one for those unfortunate enough to experience it.