The Economic Influence of Big Unions

Abstract

Organized labor in the United States is charac terized by the concentration of membership strength in a few, large unions, particularly the Teamsters, Automobile Workers, Machinists, Steelworkers, Carpenters, Electrical Workers, and Mine Workers. Unions of such large size pose certain dan gers to the nation's welfare. Economists, however, tend to minimize any effect the labor movement as a whole may have on comparative wage movements or on the pace of inflation. An analysis of the economic impact of six union groups—auto mobiles, coal, construction, railroads, steel, and trucking—f or the 1947-1959 period leads to the conclusion that the large unions possessed a substantial degree of independent decision- making power during this period and that the unions' use of their power significantly affected the industries within which they operated. During the postwar years, the six big unions —notably the coal, railroad, and steel unions—placed the in dustries within which they were operative under considerable strain. For the same period, however, the effects of union activity on the economy as a whole were secondary to other influences. The likelihood for the future is that the compara tive economic impact of unions will be more important than it was during the postwar inflationary years.