Abstract
This study provides detailed statistics by state, industry, occupation, and worker characteristics on private sector wage and salary workers covered by union collective bargaining agreements but who are not union members. A distinction is made between those workers who value the benefits of coverage more than the cost of membership, the true free riders, and those who do not, the induced riders. A probit union membership equation is estimated on a sample which excludes the covered nonmembers. Predicted probabilities are then calculated from the estimated model, yielding a quantifiable measure of the true free-rider problem.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Abowd, John M., and Henry S. Farber. “Job Queues and the Union Status of Workers.”Industrial and Labor Relations Review 35 (April 1982): 354–67.
Albanese, Robert, and David D. Van Fleet. “Rational Behavior in Groups: The Free-Rider Tendency.”Academy of Management Review 10 (April 1985): 244–55.
Bennett, James T., and Manuel H. Johnson. “The Impact of Right-to-Work Laws on the Economic Behavior of Local Unions: A Property Rights Perspective.”Journal of Labor Research 1 (Spring 1980): 1–27.
Bloom, Gordon F., and Herbert R. Northrup.Economics of Labor Relations, 9th ed. Homewood, Ill.: Irwin, 1981.
Chaison, Gary N., and Dileep G. Dhavale. “The Choice Between Union Membership and Free-Rider Status.”Journal of Labor Research 13 (Fall 1992): 355–69.
Davis, Joe C., and John H. Huston. “Right-to-Work Laws and Free Riding.”Economic Inquiry 31 (January 1993): 52–8.
Ellwood, David P., and Glenn Fine. “The Impact of Right-to-Work Laws on Union Organizing.”Journal of Political Economy 95 (April 1987): 250–74.
Farber, Henry S. “Right-to-Work Laws and the Extent of Unionization.”Journal of Labor Economics 2 (July 1984): 319–52.
Freeman, Richard B., and James L. Medoff.What Do Unions Do? New York: Basic Books, 1984.
Hirsch, Barry T. “The Determinants of Unionization: An Analysis of Interarea Differences.”Industrial and Labor Relations Review 33 (January 1980): 147–61.
Hundley, Greg. “Collective Bargaining Coverage of Union Members and Nonmembers in the Public Sector.”Industrial Relations 32 (Winter 1993): 72–93.
Lumsden, Keith and Craig Peterson. “The Effect of Right-to-Work Laws on Unionization in the United States.”Journal of Political Economy 83 (December 1975): 1237–48.
Moore, William J., and Robert J. Newman. “On the Prospects for American Trade Union Growth: A Cross-Section Analysis.”Review of Economics and Statistics 57 (November 1975): 435–45.
_____, “The Effects of Right-to-Work Laws: A Review of the Literature.”Industrial and Labor Relations Review 38 (July 1985): 571–86.
Wessels, Walter J. “Economic Effects of Right-to-Work Laws.”Journal of Labor Research 2 (Spring 1981): 55–75.
Zax, Jeffrey S., and Casey Ichniowski. “Excludability and the Effects of Free Riders: Right-to-Work Laws and Local Public Sector Unionization.”Public Finance Quarterly 19 (July 1991): 293–315.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
The author gratefully thanks Barry T. Hirsch, David A. Macpherson, and an anonymous referee for their constructive comments and insightful ideas. Any errors remain the sole responsibility of the author.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sobel, R.S. Empirical evidence on the union free-rider problem: Do right-to-work laws matter?. Journal of Labor Research 16, 347–365 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02685762
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02685762