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Multiemployer Bargaining And Monopoly: Labor-Management Collusion And A Partial Solution, Anthony B. Sanders

Anthony B Sanders

Multiemployer collective bargaining relationships between unions and employer associations easily devolve into legalized cartels. Once unions establish themselves as the bargaining representative for employers’ employees, the employers have much to gain from banding together as an association, raising their prices and eliminating non-union competition, with unions happily serving as enforcement agents in the scheme. In return, unions receive a share of the increased oligopolistic profits in the form of higher wages and benefits. A threat to such a cartel is an employer who wants to bargain with the union but does not want to accept the terms the association has …