Workers Acting in a Collective Manner - Essay Example

Trade Unions Organizations Introduction In specific, a trade union consists of workers acting in a collective manner to protect their interests mutually. (Harcourt & Wood, pp. 18-21, 2006). According to statistics, more than 18 million US workers belong to unions (Trant, pp. 341-354, 2010). In fact, there are many industries where these unions are so strong that it is impossible to get a job without having their affiliation (Howell, pp. 3-4, 2007). Despite the fact that researchers have revealed that union membership is declining in many countries but still the percentages are considerable enough in a number of countries where (Trant, pp. 341-354, 2010). Quite understandably, the macro-environmental factors in which trade union organizations are operating are no more the same, and the same has greatly tamed the outlook, and has shaped ideologies of trade unions. This paper is an attempt to have a brief look at these changes, their causes, and the recent evolution in the role of trade unions, adaption of trade unions to the same and future directions. Discussion It was in 1790 when for the first time, some skilled craftsmen, in response to the populist movements of that time, organized themselves into groups, which were later known as unions. Their main aim was to ensure that there is a mutually agreed minimum wage between the employees and the employers and they went from shop to shop in order to ensure that no labour accepts wage lower than this minimum wage limit. However, in the coming years, due to depressions and many other factors, unions’ membership witnessed a decline. Nevertheless, this era was when the United States was changing gears towards the industrial revolution. Finally, it was in 1869, when a trade union appeared on the scene with the name of Knights of Labor. By the end of 1886, Knights of Labour had more than 0.7 million workers under its banner (Harcourt & Wood, pp. 18-21, 2006). However, Knights of Labour had more political motives rather than focusing on the welfare of its members. The main aim of KOL was to replace the system of capitalism with socialism and it was working under the umbrella of the populist movements of that time. In the same year, American Federation of Labour (AFL) formed by Samuel Gompers came into being, which focused mainly on the bread and butter gains of its members. Unlike Knights of Labour, the focus of AFL was not only to improve the wages but also to improve the working conditions. Just before the First World War, membership of AFL had peaked to 5.5 million members. However, the unions once again witnessed a decline due to factors like the post world war problems, great depression, death of Samuel Gompers and others. Nonetheless, during the late 1930s, much legislation supported and allowed workers to unionize. Furthermore, this spurred the growth of unions and it was in 1970s when the figures for union workers topped to reach the mark of 21 million workers (Fernie & Metcalf, pp. 24-29, 2005). However, since then the membership has been on a decline and the rest of this paper will focus on the same. For the past few decades, many developments have influenced the trade unions greatly. Firstly, it is because extended labor laws and health and safety departments for labors, like Occupational Safety and Health administration (OSHA) that have decreased the need of formal trade unions. History reveals that the industrial revolution brought along many problems with it self. Most of them were in form of workers’ grievances. Owners of factories with their capitalist ideology were a great example of rational decision theory, where businesses try to maximize their profits and minimize their costs without considering the impact on other stakeholders. Employers had only one thing in their mind and that was to increase the production to make more profits by taking advantage of economies of scale and mass production. Despite the fact that in the early 19th century, human resource departments came but their underlying idea was to help owners in better exploitation of workers (Frege & Kelly, pp. 52-56, 2004). These HRDs viewed people as passive resources for the business, which should be minimized in order to increase the profit margins. However, this approach has changed greatly. Hard approach has been replaced by the soft approach to human resource management, where employees are viewed as an integral part of the company and employee satisfaction appears at the top in the list of objectives. In this competitive environment, employers have understood that the key to sustainable competitive advantage is with the development of their human resource. Therefore, better working conditions is no longer as big as of an issue as it was a century ago (Smethurst & Carter, pp. 94, 2009). Secondly, as economies are moving towards advancement, the manufacturing sectors in advanced countries are squeezing and instead there is boom in the services sector. For example, in developed countries, the services sector now accounts for more than 75 percent of the GDP; however, this percentage was much lower a few decades (Trant, pp. 341-354, 2010). Quite understandably, this has given rise to more white-collar jobs. Moreover, when companies are following approaches like flat organizational structures, empowered work teams, pay for performance, etc, these workers do not feel any need to join unions. Most of companies have also acted smart by outsourcing most of lower level jobs to poor countries. Quite reasonably, due to high inflation, high unemployment, etc, workers from these countries have lower bargaining power and most of their plants in these countries have remained union free. Another major point under this heading is the recent boom of diversified workforce. Over the past decades, there has been an enormous increase in women, minorities, and part time workers, joining the work force for both blue collar and white-collar jobs. Statistics reveal that these workers are not inclined towards joining the unions and thus, the union power has further declined (Fernie & Metcalf, pp. 24-29, 2005). Furthermore, allegations on unions and attention towards their critics have also made a considerable amount of difference towards the inclination of workers towards unions. Critics argue that unions have been major contributors towards unemployment, inefficiency, etc. Industries where unions have considerable amount of influence in form of unions shops and closed shops, increased wages than the equilibrium price causes unemployment to increase. Unions can exert extreme influence by not allowing the company to hire outside workers, thus, affecting the productivity and image of the company. Unions may increase the overall inflation because high wages would increase the overall cost of production of these companies, therefore, the employers would have either to accept the decreased profit margins or increase the price of the product, which will result in inflation. Even if the employer agrees to lower profit margins, this would leave him with low retained earnings to invest and expand the business in future leading towards inefficiency. Moreover, unions were also relevant in the past because there were a few large industries and mobilizing workers from those factories was a relatively trouble-free task compared to today, where there are many small industries. Even in the manufacturing sectors, there are many small factories geographically diverse (Howell, pp. 3-4, 2007). Quite clearly, the role of trade unions is bound to change under the context of above-mentioned factors. Important here to note is that this does not mean that unions have no longer relevant but it stresses that unions will have to make a shift from “what they were” to “what they should be”. Unions no longer can fight for making union shops, closed shop or agency shops, however, today the issues that unions can highlight are corporate social responsibility, employee stock ownership programs, job security of employees, sustainable polices, environmental friendly acts, social marketing, minority representation, work force diversity, over all unemployment and others (Frege & Kelly, pp. 52-56, 2004). Many unions already have taken this role as social agents. Moreover, unions are also responding to challenges by various mergers. It was in Germany in 2001 when a single union consisting of more than 3 million members emerged because of the merger of five big unions working in different companies of the service sector. It was in 2002 in Britain, when Amalgamated Engineering and Electrical Union (AEEU) and Manufacturing Science Finance (MFS) merged to form the second largest union consisting of one million members. European countries that have reported wide scale mergers of unions over the past decade include Britain, Austria, Germany, Norway, etc (Smethurst & Carter, pp. 94, 2009). Moreover, most of unions have now turned actively towards government to make laws to increase union powers. This has been stressed recently because of this declining membership has led to decreased bargaining and negotiation power of these groups and only legal power can offset this decrease. It appears that in capitalistic countries, unions are losing coverage; however, unions that exist in welfare states and socialist nations have a greater probability of survival (Howell, pp. 3-4, 2007). References Fernie, Sue, & Metcalf, David. 2005. Trade unions: resurgence or demise? Routledge. Frege, Carola M., & Kelly, John E. 2004. Varieties of unionism: strategies for union revitalization in a globalizing economy. Oxford University Press. Harcourt, Mark, & Wood, Geoffrey. 2006. Trade unions and democracy: strategies and perspectives. Transaction Publishers. Howell, Chris. 2007. Trade unions and the state: the construction of industrial relations institutions in Britain, 1890-2000. Princeton University Press. Smethurst, John B., & Carter, Peter. 2009. Historical directory of trade unions. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. Trant, William. 2010. Trade Unions, Their Origin and Objects, Influence and Efficacy. Read Books. Read More