This paper argues that an important mechanism linking increasing rents and the rising earnings’ inequality among workers with similar skills is the increase in domestic outsourcing and the growth of networked forms of production. This has multiplied contractual relationships and legal claims to profit and rents that reflect interfirm power relations. Firms with the greatest clout are able to claim the largest share of the rents; the weakest struggle to remain viable.
AppelbaumEileenBattRosemary. 1994. The new American workplace: Transforming work systems in the United States. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University/ILR Press.
5.
AppelbaumEileenBattRosemary. 2014. Private equity at work: When wall street manages main street. New York: Russell Sage.
6.
AppelbaumEileenBattRosemaryClarkIan. 2013. Implications of financial capitalism for employment relations research: Evidence from breach of trust and implicit contracts in private equity buyouts. British Journal of Industrial Relations51(3): 498–518.
7.
BakerDean. 2016a. Rigged: How globalization and the rules of the modern economy were structured to make the rich richer. Washington, DC: Center for Economic and Policy Research.
8.
BakerDean. 2016b. The upward redistribution of income: Are rents the story?Review of Radical Political Economy48 (4): 529–43.
9.
BallandPierre-AlexandreDe VaanMathijsBoschmaRon. 2013. The dynamics of interfirm networks along the industry life cycle: The case of the global video game industry, 1987–2007. Journal of Economic Geography13(5):741–765.
BarthErlingBrysonAlexDavisJames C.FreemanRichard. 2016. It’s where you work: Increases in the dispersion of earnings across establishments and individuals in the United States. Journal of Labor Economics34 (S2, Pt. 2): S67–97.
13.
BattRosemaryAppelbaumEileen. 2017. The networked organization: Implications for jobs and inequality. In Making Work More Equal: A New Labour Market Segmentation Approach, ed. GrimshawDamianFaganColetteHebsonGailTavoraIsabel. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
14.
BattRosemaryDoellgastVirginiaKwonHyunji. 2006. Service management and employment systems in U.S. and Indian call centers. In Brookings Trade Forum 2005: Offshoring White-collar Work—The Issues and Implications, eds. CollinsSusan M.BrainardLael, 335–372. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.
15.
BattRosemaryHolmanDavidHoltgreweUrsula. 2009. The globalization of service work: Comparative institutional perspectives on call centers. Industrial & Labor Relations Review62 (4): 453–88.
16.
BattRosemaryNoharaHiro. 2009. How institutions and business strategies affect wages: A cross national study of call centers. Industrial & Labor Relations Review62 (4): 533–52.
17.
BernhardtAnnetteBattRosemaryHousemanSusanAppelbaum.Eileen2016. Domestic outsourcing in the United States: A research agenda to assess trends and effects on job quality. Department of Labor Conference on the Future of Work, U.S. Department of Labor, Washington, DC., December 10.
BlonigenBruce A.PierceJustin R.2016. Evidence for the effects of mergers on market power and efficiency (Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2016-082). Washington, DC: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. doi:10.17016/FEDS.2016.082.
20.
BrennanAndrew. 2014. Eating up: Downstream markets will renew (IBISWorld Industry Report No. 72231). Food Service Contractors in the US. www.ibisworld.com.
21.
CappelliPeter.2016. Trends in alternative work and the power of ideas. Presentation, Russell Sage Foundation Workshop, Non-standard Work: How Do We Measure It and What Is Its Impact on Workers, Workplaces and The Economy?New York, NY, April 1.
22.
CardDavidCardosoAna RuteKlinePatrick. 2016a. Bargaining, sorting, and the gender wage gap: Quantifying the impact of firms on the relative pay of women. Quarterly Journal of Economics131 (2): 633–86.
ChandlerAlfred. 1977. The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
25.
ChandlerAlfred. 1990. Scale and Scope: The Dynamics of Industrial Capitalism. Cambridge: Harvard University Press (with assistance from Takashi Hikino).
26.
CoaseRonald H.1937. The nature of the firm. Economica4 (16): 386–405.
DavisAlyssaMishelLawrence. 2014. CEO pay continues to rise as typical workers are paid less (EPI Issue Brief No. 380). Washington, DC: Economic Policy Institute.
DubeArindrajitKaplanEthan. 2010. Does outsourcing reduce wages in the low-wage service occupations? Evidence from janitors and guards. Industrial & Labor Relations Review63 (2): 287–306. http://www.irle.berkeley.edu/workingpapers/171-08.pdf.
Food Chain Workers Alliance and Solidarity Research Cooperative. 2016. No piece of the pie: U.S. food workers in 2016. November. http://foodchainworkers.org/.
GoldschmidtDeborahSchmiederJohannes F.2015. The rise of domestic outsourcing and the evolution of the German wage structure (NBER Working Paper No. 21366). http://www.nber.org/papers/w21366.pdf.
37.
GordonDavid M.ReichMichaelEdwardsRichard. 1982. Segmented Work, Divided Workers: The Historical Transformation of Labor in the United States. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
38.
GospelHowardPendletonAndrewVitolsSigurt, eds. 2014. Financialisation, New Investment Funds, and Labour: An International Comparison. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
39.
GrimshawDamianWillmottHughRuberyJill. 2005. Interorganizational networks: Trust, power, and the employment relationship. In Fragmenting Work: Blurring Organizational Boundaries and Disordering Hierarchies, eds. MarchingtonMickGrimshawDamianRuberyJillWillmottHugh, 39–62. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
HelperSusanMacDuffieJohn PaulSabelCharles. 2000. Pragmatic collaborations: Advancing knowledge while controlling opportunism. Industrial and Corporate Change9(3): 443–488.
44.
HelperSusanSakoMari. 2010. Management innovation in supply chain: Appreciating Chandler in the twenty-first century. Industrial and Corporate Change19 (2): 399–429. http://icc.oxfordjournals.org/content/19/2/399.short.
45.
JacobySanford. 1985. Employing Bureaucracy: Managers, Unions and the Transformation of Work in American Industry 1900–1945. New York: Columbia University Press.
46.
JaikumarRamchandran. 1986. Postindustrial manufacturing. Harvard Business Review64 (6): 69–76.
47.
JensenMichael C.MecklingWilliam H.1976. Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure. SSRN, July. http://ssrn.com/abstract=94043.
48.
JiMinWoongWeilDavid. 2015. The impact of franchising on labor standards compliance. Industrial and Labor Relations Review68(5): 977–1006.
KatzLawrence F.KruegerAlan B.2016. The rise and nature of alternative work arrangements in the United States, 1995–2015 (NBER Working Paper No. 22667, September). http://www.nber.org/papers/w22667.
52.
KogutBruceZanderUdo. 1992. Knowledge of the firm, combinative capabilities, and the replication of technology. Organization Science3 (3): 383–97.
53.
KrippnerGreta. 2011. Capitalizing on Crisis: The Political Origins of the Rise of Finance. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
LakhaniTashlin.2016. The effect of ownership on human resource practices in networked firms: Evidence from a franchise system. Unpublished manuscript, December.
LepakDavidSnellScott. 1999. The human resource architecture: Toward a theory of human capital allocation and development. Academy of Management Review24 (1): 31–48.
MacDuffieJohn Paul. 1995. Human resource bundles and manufacturing performance: Organizational logic and flexible production systems in the world auto industry. Industrial & Labor Relations Review48 (2):197–201.
60.
MarchingtonMickGrimshawDamianRuberyJillWillmottHugh, eds. 2005. Fragmenting Work: Blurring Organizational Boundaries and Disordering Hierarchies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
61.
MarglinStephen. 1975. What do bosses do? Part II. The Review of Radical Political Economics7(1): 20–37.
PerraudinCorinnePetitHeloiseThèvenotNadineTinelBrunoValentinJulie. 2014. Inter-firm dependency and employment inequalities: Theoretical hypotheses and empirical tests on French subcontracting relationships. Review of Radical Political Economics46 (2): 199–220.
WeilDavid. 2014. The Fissured Workplace. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
76.
WhitfordJosh.2006. The New Old Economy: Networks, Institutions, and the Organizational Transformation of American Manufacturing. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.
77.
WilliamsonOliver. 1975. Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Antitrust Implications. New York: Free Press.
78.
WilliamsonOliver. 1985. The Economic Institutions of Capitalism. New York: Free Press.
