Converging Divergences

by Katz, Harry C.

• ISBN13: 9780801436741
• ISBN10: 0801436745
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-12-01
• Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr

Summary

Exploring recent changes in employment practices in seven industrialized countries (Australia, Britain, Germany, Italy, Japan, Sweden, and the United States) and in two essential industries (automobile and telecommunications), Harry C. Katz and Owen Darbishire find that traditional national systems of employment are being challenged by four cross-national patterns. The patterns, which are becoming ever more prevalent, can be categorized as low-wage, human resource management, Japanese-oriented, and joint team-based strategies.

The authors go on to show that these changing employment patterns axe closely related to the decline of unions and growing income inequality. Drawing upon plant-level evidence on emerging employment practices, they provide a comprehensive analysis of changes in employment systems and labor-management relations. They conclude that while the variation in employment patterns is increasing within countries, evidence suggests that there is much commonality across countries in the nature of that variation and also similarity in the processes

Author Biography

Harry C. Katz is the Jack Sheinman Professor of Collective Bargaining and Director of the Institute of Collective Bargaining in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University.

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
Introduction: The Links between Increased Inequality and Union Decline	1	(16)
United States	17	(53)
United Kingdom	70	(66)
Australia	136	(33)
Germany	169	(60)
Japan, Sweden, and Italy	229	(34)
Summary: Increased Variation within Countries but Similarities across Countries	263	(22)
References	285	(22)
About the Authors	307	(2)
Index	309