TY  - JOUR
AU  - Pencavel,John H.
AU  - Hartsog,Catherine E.
TI  - A Reconsideration of the Effects of Unionism on Relative Wages and Employment in the United States, 1920-80
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 1316
PY  - 1984
Y2  - March 1984
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w1316
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w1316.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
John H. Pencavel
Department of Economics
Landau Economics
Stanford University
Stanford, CA  94305-6072
Tel: 650-723-3981
E-Mail: pencavel@stanford.edu
AB  - H. Gregg Lewis' estimates of the relative wage effect of unionism between 1920 and 1958 are routinely cited though they have rarely been subject to scrutiny. This paper extends Lewis' data to 1980 and, in particular, we construct a series on union membership that links up with the data available in the 1970's from the Current Population Surveys. We proceed to reexamine the effects of trade unions both on relative wages and on relative man hours worked.Our estimates of the relative wage effect are similar to Lewis' though these are not measured with precision and a wide range of estimates are consistent with the results. With respect to the effect of unionism on relative man hours worked, we are not at all satisfied that the analysis of these data clearly points to the existence of a negative effect.
ER  -