Contesting the Great Compression
The National Labor Relations Board and Skilled Workers’ Struggle to Control Wage Differentials, 1935–1955
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12178136 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Bryant Etheridge (Bridgewater State University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 32 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 183-213 |
| Publication date | 2020-03-05 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Policy History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0898-0306 • E-ISSN: 1528-4190 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0898030620000032 |
| OpenAlex | W3009969786 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 27 |
This article argues that federal labor policy was a factor in causing the Great Compression, the dramatic compression of skill-based wage differentials that occurred in the 1940s, and in bringing it to an end. By giving the National Labor Relations Board the power to determine the appropriate collective-bargaining unit, New Dealers gave industrial unions the means with which to build a more egalitarian wage structure. Unskilled and semiskilled workers seized the opportunity and voted themselves big pay raises. Skilled craftsmen responded by petitioning the NLRB for permission to form their own craft bargaining units, a process known as “craft severance.” As conservatives gained influence in Washington in the 1940s, the board adopted a bargaining-unit policy more favorable to craft unions. By the early 1950s, skilled craftsmen had regained control of their wage demands and thereby helped bring the Great Compression to a halt
Bargaining power · Collective bargaining · Control (management · Craft · Economics · Labor relations · Labour economics · Management · Political science · Power (physics · Severance · Unit (ring theory · Wage · Labor Movements and Unions · Law · Political Economy and Marxism · Race, History, and American Society · Industrial Relations
The state and the unions
Capital in the Twenty-First Century
Fear Itself
Wage Determination Under Trade Unions
Marshall and Friedman on Union Strength
A Century of Occupational Differentials in Manufacturing
Income Inequality in the United States, 1913-1998
Revisiting the Great Compression
New Deals
The CIO, 1935-1955
From the Wagner Act to Taft-Hartley
New Deals
Wage Determination under Trade Unions
Collective Bargaining in the Automobile Industry
"Raiding among the "Legitimate-Unions
From the Wagner Act to Taft-Hartley
The Reshaping of the National Labor Relations Board
The Craft-Industrial Issue Revisited
The Welder's Search for Craft Recognition
Unions and the Great Compression of wage inequality in the US at mid-century
Unionism and the Dispersion of Wages
Explaining Black-White Wage Convergence, 1940-1950
Afl-Cio
Some Factors Influencing the Upgrading of Negroes in the Southern Petroleum Refining Industry
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |