Labor Law Reform: One Step Forward and Two Steps Back

Abstract

This article deals with the question of whether the reforms proposed by the labor law traditionalists are desirable on economic grounds, and if not, what types of reform might be offered. The specific proposals include increased job security, increased employee participation in decision making, and reform of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The difficulty for traditional labor law reformers is that they have not yet accepted the challenge of designing proposals for today's more competitive labor and product markets. Until this changes, reform efforts can be shown to be backward steps.

JEL Classification: J58, K31