Pattern Bargaining and UAW Wage Determination: An Empirical Examination

Author
Keywords
Abstract

The bargaining behavior of the UAW is well-known: the pattern set by a
target settlement in the automobile industry serves as the union's goal in
subsequent UAW contracts in many industries. Two new data sets covering UAW
contract outcomes are constructed to estimate the empirical importance of the
target outcome for subsequent negotiations in the post-war period up to l979.
Conditions determining variations in the amount of uniformity achieved by pattern
following in both wage levels and percent increases are analyzed. Bargaining
unit size and industry are found to have important influences on. pattern
following while measures of firm profitability do not.

Year of Publication
1990
Number
275
Date Published
10/1990
Publication Language
eng
Citation Key
Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 45, No. 3, April, 1992
URL
Working Papers