Collective Bargaining and Faculty Job Satisfaction

• Author: Steven E. Henson,John M. Krieg,Charles S. Wassell,David W. Hedrick
• Published date: 01 July 2013
• Date: 01 July 2013
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/irel.12027

Collective Bargaining and Faculty Job

Satisfaction

JOHN M. KRIEG, CHARLES S. WASSELL JR., DAVID

W. HEDRICK, and STEVEN E. HENSON*

Estimates of the impact of union membership on job satisfaction suffer from non-

random self-selection of employees into unions. In this paper, we circumvent this

problem by examining the impact on satisfaction of collective bargaining repre-

sentation, rather than of union membership. We use a two-stage technique that

controls for nonrandom selection of faculty into institutions, and apply that to a

panel of faculty at repeatedly observed four-year universities. We find that bar-

gaining agreements increase satisfaction with compensation but reduce satisfaction

with faculty workload. Bargaining has no statistically measurable impact on over-

all job satisfaction or on faculty’s satisfaction with their authority to make deci-

sions regarding their instructional duties.

Introduction

STATE LEGISLATORS HAVE RECENTLY TURNED THEIR ATTENTION TOWARD COLLEC-

TIVE bargaining on university campuses. Citing potential budgetary savings, the

states of Ohio and Wisconsin, among others, have moved to limit the scope of

collective bargaining by faculty in higher education. Among the many argu-

ments against these moves, union supporters claim that unions increase faculty

satisfaction with their jobs, thus creating a better work environment which

leads to less turnover (Clark 2001; Kosteas 2011), less absenteeism (Clegg

1983), and higher productivity (Mangione and Quinn 1975). This study empiri-

cally tests the impact of collective bargaining on faculty satisfaction with their

job, workplace, compensation, and ability to influence campus decisions.

Union objectives may be broadly characterized as improving workers’welfare

and satisfaction through enhancing the work environment and compensation.

* The authors’affiliations are, respectively, Professor of Economics at Western Washington University.

Email: John.Krieg@wwu.edu; Professor of Economics at Central Washington University. Email: dhe-

drick@cwu.edu; Associate Professor of Economics at Central Washington University. Email: WassellC@

cwu.edu; Professor of Economics at Western Washington University. Email: Steve.Henson@wwu.edu. The

authors wish to acknowledge D. Mark Anderson for his helpful comments on this paper. Email: John.

krieg@wwu.edu.

INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, Vol. 52, No. 3 (July 2013). ©2013 Regents of the University of California

Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc., 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA, and 9600 Garsington

Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK.

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Yet a number of studies have come to the puzzling conclusion that union

members are less satisfied than nonunionized workers (in the United States,

Borjas 1979, and Schwochau 1987; in Australia, Miller 1990; in the UK,

Bender and Sloane 1998; in Canada, Meng 1990). Numerous explanations

have been offered to account for the apparent negative relationship between

union membership and satisfaction. Most commonly, these studies compare

members with nonmembers in national samples of industrialized workers.

However, as pointed out by Pfeffer and Davis-Blake (1990), there is tremen-

dous within-industry and within-occupation variation in working conditions,

which influence job satisfaction. Typical controls for these conditions in

national surveys are crude and likely fail to capture covariates with worker

satisfaction. In a similar vein, unobserved individual characteristics may influ-

ence estimation of satisfaction. If individuals who experience lower satisfaction

are more likely to join unions, then finding a negative impact of unions on sat-

isfaction is not surprising. In other words, being a union member per se may

bear little relation to job satisfaction, once the self-sorting of workers has been

considered.

1

Indeed, using a nationwide British survey, Bryson, Cappellari,

and Lucifora (2004) present evidence that self-sorting into unions is the cause

of estimated lower satisfaction among union members.

Given that faculty’s right to engage in collective bargaining is under debate

in the United States, this study departs from previous work by examining the

impacts of collective bargaining on satisfaction, rather than further exploring

the effects of union membership. Thus, rather than focusing on the difference

between individuals who choose to join a union and those who do not, we

explore the impact of bargaining agreements that cover all employees—both

union members and nonmembers—and compare faculty covered by an agree-

ment with those who are not. This approach has significant advantages over

prior work that examines the membership–satisfaction relationship. First, while

the individual decision to become a union member is largely immune from

public policy influence, policy can create or eliminate the right of faculty to

enter into collective bargaining agreements. Improved understanding of the

impact collective bargaining has on all faculty will better inform policymakers

regarding the role of collective bargaining in universities. Second, by focusing

on collective bargaining rather than on membership, this study avoids the

potential simultaneity of union membership and satisfaction that biases esti-

mates of the effect that individual membership choice has on satisfaction. Of

course, it is possible that individuals self-select into institutions with (or

1

Bender and Sloane (1998) attempt to deal with this by using a two-step estimation methodology in

which membership in a union is first predicted and then used to estimate satisfaction. Their findings suggest

the negative impact of unionization is reduced, but not eliminated.

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