Labor unions in the 1990s face tremendous challenges on all fronts. Intensive international and domestic competition, industrial deregulation, and slow economic growth have weakened their collective bargaining position. Organizing new members and retaining existing ones have been made difficult by the changing expectations of workers and the limitations of current labor laws. Together, these forces have led to declining membership and influence.These difficult circumstances, however, do not signal the end of unionism, or mandate a universal response from all unions. Instead, they herald an era of choices. David Weil presents a pathbreaking framework to guide union leaders in these complex times. Drawing on the ideas of strategic planning developed in the private sector, Weil provides labor leaders with the tools to assess the critical features of their environment, and to design and implement economically sustainable collective bargaining agreements, organizing drives, and other innovative programs.Weil explains the impact of economic, technologic, governmental, and labor market forces on union strategy. He details the obstacles to new initiatives and offers methods to overcome them, from adapting the union's organizational structure to redirecting its internal financial resources. Based on his work with national, regional, and local unions as well as his academic expertise in labor relations and economics, Weil presents a rich combination of practical experience, academic evidence, and illustrative case studies from the construction, manufacturing, service and public sectors. He demonstrates how unions have succeeded by creating economically sustainable collective bargaining agreements and organizing initiatives. In Turning the Tide, labor leaders and scholars of industrial relations will find exciting new approaches to strengthen unions and labor-management relations for the next decade.

Turning the Tide: Strategic Planning for Labor Unions (Emerging Issues in Employee Relations)

Weil, David

Business & Money

Lexington Books

Which SUVs are most likely to rollover? What cities have the unhealthiest drinking water? Which factories are the most dangerous polluters? What cereals are the most nutritious? In recent decades, governments have sought to provide answers to such critical questions through public disclosure to force manufacturers, water authorities, and others to improve their products and practices. Corporate financial disclosure, nutritional labels, and school report cards are examples of such targeted transparency policies. At best, they create a light-handed approach to governance that improves markets, enriches public discourse, and empowers citizens. But such policies are frequently ineffective or counterproductive. Based on an analysis of eighteen U.S. and international policies, Full Disclosure shows that information is often incomplete, incomprehensible, or irrelevant to consumers, investors, workers, and community residents. To be successful, transparency policies must be accurate, keep ahead of disclosers' efforts to find loopholes, and, above all, focus on the needs of ordinary citizens.

Full Disclosure: The Perils and Promise of Transparency

Graham, Mary

FUNG, Archon

Economics

Cambridge University Press

For much of the twentieth century, large companies employing many workers formed the bedrock of the U.S. economy. Today, on the list of big business's priorities, sustaining the employer-worker relationship ranks far below building a devoted customer base and delivering value to investors. As David Weil's groundbreaking analysis shows, large corporations have shed their role as direct employers of the people responsible for their products, in favor of outsourcing work to small companies that compete fiercely with one another. The result has been declining wages, eroding benefits, inadequate health and safety conditions, and ever-widening income inequality.
From the perspectives of CEOs and investors, fissuring--splitting off functions that were once managed internally--has been a phenomenally successful business strategy, allowing companies to become more streamlined and drive down costs. Despite giving up direct control to subcontractors, vendors, and franchises, these large companies have figured out how to maintain quality standards and protect the reputation of the brand. They produce brand-name products and services without the cost of maintaining an expensive workforce. But from the perspective of workers, this lucrative strategy has meant stagnation in wages and benefits and a lower standard of living--if they are fortunate enough to have a job at all.
Weil proposes ways to modernize regulatory policies and laws so that employers can meet their obligations to workers while allowing companies to keep the beneficial aspects of this innovative business strategy.

The Fissured Workplace: Why Work Became So Bad for So Many and What Can Be Done to Improve It

Harvard University Press

For much of the twentieth century, large companies employing many workers formed the bedrock of the U.S. economy. Today, as David Weil’s groundbreaking analysis shows, large corporations have shed their role as direct employers of the people responsible for their products, in favor of outsourcing work to small companies that compete fiercely with one another. The result has been declining wages, eroding benefits, inadequate health and safety conditions, and ever-widening income inequality.
“Authoritative…[The Fissured Workplace] shed[s] important new light on the resurgence of the power of finance and its connection to the debasement of work and income distribution.” ―Robert Kuttner, New York Review of Books
“The kinds of workplace fissuring discussed here―subcontracting, franchising and global supply chains-―have been the subjects of a number of studies detailing the employment effects that Weil describes. The Fissured Workplace is unusual in bringing this research together into an integrated, detailed and decidedly policy-oriented analysis…It makes a convincing case that the better regulation of fissured workplaces is a first step towards reversing the erosion of pay and conditions at the bottom of the labor market.” ―Virginia Doellgast, Times Higher Education

Bigger Isn't Necessarily Better: Lessons from the Harvard Home Builder Study

Bigger Isn’t Necessarily Better examines the performance and operation of the US homebuilding sector based on a detailed survey of large home builders conducted by the authors in the period of the great building boom of the 2000s. In contrast to the many books that have focused on the financial side of the housing sector prior to the Great Recession, the book examines the operational side of the industry and what did, and, more importantly, what did not, happen during the period of unprecedented growth. Despite the rise of very large, national homebuilders during the boom years from 1999 to 2005 and the consolidation of the industry that accompanied it, the authors find that major homebuilders often did not adopt innovations in areas ranging from information technology, supply chain practices, and work site management, nor improve their operational performance. Given this, the book discusses what homebuilders can learn from other industries as they face a challenging future.

Abernathy, Frederick

Baker, Kermit

Colton, Kent

Real Estate

Bigger Isn’t Necessarily Better examines the performance and operation of the US homebuilding sector based on a detailed survey of large home builders conducted by the authors in the period of the great building boom of the 2000s. In contrast to the many books that have focused on the financial side of the housing sector prior to the Great Recession, the book examines the operational side of the industry and what did, and, more importantly, what did not, happen during the period of unprecedented growth. Despite the rise of very large, national homebuilders during the boom years from 1999 to 2005 and the consolidation of the industry that accompanied it, the authors find that major homebuilders often did not adopt innovations in areas ranging from information technology, supply chain practices, and work site management, nor improve their operational performance. Given this, the book discusses what homebuilders can learn from other industries as they face a challenging future.

Economic Growth: International Edition

Labor unions in the 1990s face tremendous challenges on all fronts. Intensive international and domestic competition, industrial deregulation, and slow economic growth have weakened their collective bargaining position. Organizing new members and retaining existing ones have been made difficult by the changing expectations of workers and the limitations of current labor laws. Together, these forces have led to declining membership and influence. 
These difficult circumstances, however, do not signal the end of unionism, or mandate a universal response from all unions. Instead, they herald an era of choices. David Weil presents a pathbreaking framework to guide union leaders in these complex times. Drawing on the ideas of strategic planning developed in the private sector, Weil provides labor leaders with the tools to assess the critical features of their environment, and to design and implement economically sustainable collective bargaining agreements, organizing drives, and other innovative programs. 
Weil explains the impact of economic, technologic, governmental, and labor market forces on union strategy. He details the obstacles to new initiatives and offers methods to overcome them, from adapting the union's organizational structure to redirecting its internal financial resources. Based on his work with national, regional, and local unions as well as his academic expertise in labor relations and economics, Weil presents a rich combination of practical experience, academic evidence, and illustrativecase studies from the construction, manufacturing, service and public sectors. He demonstrates how unions have succeeded by creating economically sustainable collective bargaining agreements and organizing initiatives. In Turning the Tide, labor leaders and scholars of industrial relations will find exciting new approaches to strengthen unions and labor-management relations for the next decade.

Turning the Tide: Strategic Planning for Labor Unions

Book Tech Inc. c. 1997

XanEdu Publishing

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Weil, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Weil, David

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Weil, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Turning the Tide: Strategic Planning for Labor Unions (Emerging Issues in Employee Relations)

Full Disclosure: The Perils and Promise of Transparency

Full Disclosure: The Perils and Promise of Transparency

The Fissured Workplace: Why Work Became So Bad for So Many and What Can Be Done to Improve It

The Fissured Workplace: Why Work Became So Bad for So Many and What Can Be Done to Improve It

Bigger Isn't Necessarily Better: Lessons from the Harvard Home Builder Study

Bigger Isn't Necessarily Better: Lessons from the Harvard Home Builder Study

Economic Growth: International Edition

Turning the Tide: Strategic Planning for Labor Unions

Turning the Tide: Strategic Planning for Labor Unions