Sociology of Labor Markets and Trade Unions: Student Guide
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157 cards
Question: How do trade unions address the gap between market allocation and social valuation of labor?
Answer: Unions shape allocation to conform with social valuation by mobilizing collective action, giving labor a unified voice, and promoting social regulatio
Question: Why are unions said to both suspend and perfect labor markets?
Answer: They suspend market competition by cartelizing labor supply and adding rigidities, yet perfect markets by creating contractual governance that protect
Question: What role do unions play in connecting labor markets to a society’s 'moral economy'?
Answer: Unions embed labor markets in social institutions, ensuring markets respect labor’s connection to workers’ physical and social lives and that employme
Question: How do unions limit the commodification of labor?
Answer: By containing market reach into workers’ social lives through institutional safeguards and social regulation, preventing complete commodification and
Question: What tension does union-imposed rigidity reflect in a capitalist economy?
Answer: The tension between the dynamism required for economic adjustment and the need for stable social relations; debates center on how much flexibility rig
Question: What are the three basic ways unions impose rigidities on labor markets?
Answer: By controlling labor supply, matching demand to supply, and enforcing standardized contractual conditions on workers and employers.
Question: How do unions function as cartels of labor sellers?
Answer: Unions enable collective contracts, correct power imbalances in individual bargains, set/enforce minimum wages and maximum hours, and can boycott empl
Question: Why are unions often exempt from strict antitrust laws?
Answer: Because they are recognized as special collective sellers of labor whose collective action corrects power imbalances and serves social regulation func
Question: How does collective action by unions protect workers compared with individual bargaining?
Answer: Collective action lets workers speak with one voice, wait out employers, and negotiate terms compatible with social life beyond the market, unlike fra
Question: What is the purpose of unions promulgating social regulation of contractual relations in labor markets?
Answer: To make markets predictable so individuals can maintain stable identities and relations, and so those with stable identities can participate in market