Description
Employment is closely connected to wealth, status, and security and is therefore a subject of interest across a range of academic disciplines. Employment Relations in the United States incorporates a wealth of research material from these different specialties to provide a historical perspective on the American workplace and the evolution of legal policies affecting employment. The analysis follows both a chronological and thematic arrangement, beginning with the importance of management practices, the growth of labor organizations and the impact of collective bargaining on employment institutions, and the subsequent rise of individual employment rights enforced through administrative and judicial means. Through its evolutionary approach, the book explains the fragmented, overlapping, and conceptually confusing regulatory environment governing workplace relations. It offers an integrated approach to such important contemporary policy issues as health care coverage, pensions, and effective dispute procedures. The book provides an analytical framework for an understanding of the unique nature of our labor markets and the role of government, employers, and unions.
Key Features
- Provides students with the historical background they need to understand how the U.S. system developed and how it differs from systems in other industrialized nations
- Discusses individual employment rights, including protection from discrimination
- Covers current policy issues in employment, including raising the minimum wage, the growth of a contingent workforce, and privatizing retirement
- Offers a unique historical and evolutionary explanation of the nature of employment relations
As a general overview of contemporary employment relations, Employment Relations in the United States is a perfect supplement to college courses in employment law, human resource management, and collective bargaining. Human resource managers, mediators, and professionals involved in labor relations will also find this an essential reference.
Table of Contents
Preface
1. Contemporary Employment Relations in Historical Perspective
The Start of a New Millenium
Analyzing "Exceptionalism": Is the United States Different and Why?
Studying Work
The Nature of Labor Contracts
An Overview of This Book
Firms and Managers
Organized Labor
Community Institutions
PART I. THE ERA OF MANAGEMENT, 1880 - 1935
2. Industrial Expansion and the Foundations of Unionisms
The Rise of Corporations
Beginnings of Collective Organization
Union Growth and Labor Conflict
From Conflict to Cooperation
3. Managerial Control and the Beginnings of State Regulation
Judges and the Law of Employment Contracts
Injunctions and Antitrust
Scientific Management and the Efficiency Movement
Welfare Capitalism and the Emergence of the Modern Personnel System
Workers' Compensation Insurance - An Early Exception to Exceptionalism
Summing up the 1920s
PART II: THE EVOLUTION OF COLLECTIVE BARGAINING
4. The Creation of Federal Labor Policy: World War I Through the New Deal
Wartime Policies and the Effect on Collective Bargaining
Labor Legislation Before the Wagner Act
The National Labor Relations (Wagner) Act of 1935
Social Legislation: Retirement, Unemployment, and Labor Standards
The Federal Mandates and the Collective Bargaining Process
5. Rise and Decline of the Labor Movement, 1935 - 2000
Founding of the CIO
The Supreme Court and the Wagner Act
Labor Relations During World War II
The Labor Management Relations (Taft-Hartley) Act, 1947
Cosolidation of Collective Bargaining and Employment Policies
Union Decline: 1970s to the Millenium
PART III: INDIVIDUAL EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS, 1960s - 2000s
6. Protecting Individuals From Discrimination
Equal Pay Act
Civil Rights Acts
Age Discrimination in Employment Act
Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990
7. Workplace Rights and Benefits
Workplace Health and Safety: OSHA
Employee Retirement and Income Security Act
Health Insurance and Employment
The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993
Exceptions to the Employment At Will Rule
PART IV: REBUILDING THE EMPLOYMENT CONTRACT: PRACTICES, POLICIES, AND POLITICS
8. Contemporary Employment Issues
Organizational Justice as an Alternative to Litigation
Bringing Unions Back In
Economic Security for U. S. Workers: Health Insurance, Pensions, and Employment Stability
9. Conclusions
Back to the Future?
The Job Machine in the 2000s
A Final Thought
Index
About the Author
