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Collective bargaining in 1990
William M. Davis and others
About 3.0 million workers are under major collective bargaining agreements (those covering 1,000 workers or more) scheduled to expire or be reopened in 1990. They account for 35 percent of the 8.5 million workers under major agreements in private industry and State and local government.
In private industry, scheduled bargaining will cover 2.1 million of the 6 million workers under major agreements, or almost 36 percent, about the same as in the last 2 years. Workers whose contracts are slated for renegotiation in 1990 are about equally divided between nonmanufacturing (1,091,000 workers) and manufacturing (1,033,000 workers). In nonmanufacturing, bargaining will be heaviest in construction with 409,000 workers; wholesale and retail trade (primarily food stores), 179,000 workers, and transportation (primarily parcel delivery), 176,000 workers. In manufacturing, the largest numbers are in transportation equipment (primarily automobiles) with 595,000 workers and apparel with 97,000 workers. (See tables 1 and 2.)
In State and local government, bargaining activity will involve 884,000 of the 2.5 million workers under major agreements, or about 35 percent. The proportion was 39 percent in 1989 and 42 percent in 1988. Local government employs somewhat more that four-fifths (740,000) of the workers (with 39 percent employed by New York City). Slightly more than one-half (387,000) are in primary and secondary education, about one-fourth are in general administration, and one-eight are in protective services. In State government, 56 percent of the workers (80,000) are in general administration.
Information on 1990 bargaining is based on data available to the Bureau of Labor Statistics as of September 30, 1989. Thus, any settlement occurring in the fourth quarter of 1989 that provide for 1990 expirations or reopenings could affect the proportion of workers scheduled for negotiations in 1990.1 The bargaining agenda will also include negotiations that continued onto 1990 on contracts that expired or were reopened in 1989 or earlier.
In addition, about 691,000 postal workers are covered by contracts that will expire in 1990. The Bureau's collective bargaining settlement series excludes Federal Government contracts.
This excerpt is from an article published in the January 1990 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.
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Footnotes
1 In private industry, 1,230,000
workers were under 218 contracts that expired or were subject to reopening by Dec. 31,
1989, for which settlements had not been reached or details of new settlements were not
available by September 30. In State and local government, 668,000 workers were under 223
such contracts.
Collective bargaining during 1991.
—Jan. 1991.Within Monthly Labor Review Online:
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