Collective bargaining calendar, (EXCERPT), Monthly Labor Review Online, January 1984

Collective bargaining calendar
crowded again in 1984

John J. Lacombe II and James R. Conley

Collective bargaining activity in 1984 will be heavy for the third consecutive year, breaking the 30-year pattern of 2 years of heavy bargaining followed by 1 year of light activity. About 635 contracts covering 38 percent, or 3 million, of the 7.9 million workers in major collective bargaining situations (involving 1,000 or more workers)¹ are scheduled to expire or are subject to reopening during the year. (See tables 1 and 2.) Typically, a "heavy" year has involved roughly two-fifths of the workers under major situations and a "light" year, fewer than three-tenths.

The cycle was broken when agreements in the automobile industry, reached early in 1982, were negotiated for a 2½-year term, rather than 3 years as had been the case since the mid-1950's. In addition, other 1982 and 1983 settlements, particularly in the construction industry, were of shorter duration than usual, reflecting the uncertainty that bargainers felt about the future based on events in the last 2 years, including recession, double-digit unemployment, deregulation, and nonunion competition.

Historically, terms of individual settlements have reflected general economic conditions; the health and strength of individual companies, industries, and unions; and the terms of pattern-setting agreements. Of course, economic conditions that will exist at the time of the coming negotiations cannot be predicted; however, current data suggest that the economic climate will be better than in recent years.

This excerpt is from an article published in the January 1984 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.

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Footnote

1 Major collective bargaining situations cover 1,000 workers or more. Agreements in these situations may be embodied in more than one contract. However, negotiations for all workers in a situation are conducted among all parties to the agreement. Thus, a situation may include one or more companies and/or one or more employee organizations that bargainb together to reach an agreement.

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