Collective Bargaining: The Next Twenty Years

Collective bargaining will evolve in the next 20 years in response to the changes taking place in the world of work and union reaction to those changes. Job security will be a central issue, with increased emphasis on reducing work time to create more jobs. We also foresee more union mergers and increased inclusion in the labor movement of workers not traditionally a part of the union's constituency. That, in turn, will further erode the effectiveness of centralized bargaining. Moreover, unions will attempt to alter their traditional role as reactors to managements' unilateral actions and see themselves as partners with management. The role of the government and the courts may alter the collective bargaining process, but whether it will erode or strengthen that process is still an open question.