LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION SERIES INEQUALITY, UNCERTAINTY, AND OPPORTUNITY The Varied and Growing Role of Finance in Labor Relations Edited By Christian E. Weller Inequality, Uncertainty, and Opportunity: The Varied and Growing Role of Finance in Labor Relations. Copyright © 2015 by the Labor and Employment Relations Association. Printed in the United States of America. All rights reserved. No part of the book may be used without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. First Edition ISBN 978-0-913447-10-9 LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION SERIES Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (published electronically beginning in 2009) Annual Research Volume (published in the summer/fall) LERA Online Membership Directory (updated daily, member/subscriber access only) LERA Newsletter (published electronically 3–4 times a year) Perspectives on Work (published once a year in the summer/fall) Perspectives on Work Online Companion (published twice a year as a supplement) Information regarding membership, subscriptions, meetings, publications, and general affairs of the LERA can be found at the Association website at www.leraweb.org. Members can make changes to their member records, including contact information, affiliations, and preferences, by accessing the online directory at the website or by contacting the LERA national office. LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign School of Labor and Employment Relations 121 Labor and Employment Relations Building 504 East Armory Ave., MC-504 Champaign, IL 61820 Telephone: 217/333-0072 Fax: 217/265-5130 Websites: www.leraweb.org E-mail: [email protected] CONTENTS Introduction .................................................................................... 1 Christian E. Weller Chapter 1 How 401(k) Plans Make Recessions Worse ...................................... 9 Teresa Ghilarducci and Joelle Saad-Lessler Chapter 2 Financialization, Collective Bargaining, and the Public Interest ............................................................................... 31 Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, Dan Brooks, Noel Cowell, Christos A. Ioannou, Martin Mulloy, Danny Roberts, Tanzia S. Saunders, and Søren Viemose Chapter 3 Gaining Traction: Socially Responsible Investments, Targeted Markets, Sustainable Impacts ........................................................ 57 Janet Boguslaw and Alexander B. Kaufman Chapter 4 Beyond Shareholder Value? The Impact of Capital Market–Oriented Business Management on Labor Relations in Germany .................................................................... 85 Klaus Dörre Chapter 5 Organizing the U.S. Financial Sector: Industry Reform and Raising Labor Standards Through Transnational Alliances ........... 119 Hina Sheikh, Stephen Lerner, and Rita Berlofa Chapter 6 Labor in the 21st Century: The Top 0.1% and the Disappearing Middle Class ............................................................................... 143 William Lazonick iii Chapter 7 Investors as Managers: How Private Equity Firms Manage Labor and Employment Relations ............................................... 197 Rosemary Batt and Eileen Appelbaum Chapter 8 Employee Stock Ownership and Profit Sharing in the New Era of Financialization and Inequality in the Distribution of Capital Income ....................................................................... 225 Joseph R. Blasi, Richard B. Freeman, and Douglas L. Kruse Chapter 9 Household Wealth Inequality, Retirement Income Security, and Financial Market Swings 1983 Through 2010 ...................... 247 Edward N. Wolff Chapter 10 Debt Lock-In: Household Debt Burden and Voluntary Quits .......................................................................... 279 Sara M. Bernardo Chapter 11 Income Diversification as Insurance in an Increasingly Risky World: Identifying Policy Goals ......................................... 299 Christian E. Weller and Jeffrey B. Wenger About the Contributors ............................................................... 329 iv Introduction Christian E. Weller University of Massachusetts Boston and Center for American Progress OVERVIEW Finance has grown in many respects in developed economies over the past three decades to the extent that financial measures and goods and services have become a pervasive part of modern market economies. As a start, financial services and employment in financial institutions make up an increasing share of employment. And nonfinancial business- es increasingly prioritize short-term performance measures to satisfy financial markets that have grown not only in size but also in importance. Moreover, households have seen a rise in risk exposure as financial markets, goods and services, and financial performance measures started to dominate. Households increasingly have to weather financial markets on their own, for instance, as they save for retirement. These large-scale trends have direct implications for labor relations at every level of the economy. The rising importance of financial markets has translated into increasing economic and labor market instability around the globe. Typical boom and bust cycles in financial markets have had larger effects on economic and job growth than in the past. Second, the way businesses operate has fundamentally changed as nonfinancial businesses increasingly adhere to short-term financial measures to satisfy those who finance their operations. And third, some individuals have seen their economic circumstances improve, in rare in- stances quite heftily, if they could find ways to benefit from the growing importance of finance. Many others, however, saw their economic secu- rity sharply erode as labor market and financial market risk exposure for households grew. What does this all mean? Understanding the myriad ways in which the growth of finance can impact the way we work can give us better insights into the causes of and potential solutions to addressing economic instability and income and wealth inequality, for instance, by creating more and better economic opportunities for many, not just a few. All chapters in this book touch on two or three of the main themes—instability, inequality, and opportunity (or lack thereof). This research volume gives readers a sense of the complex and pervasive link between finance and labor relations. It addresses key connections 1 2 INEQUALITY, UNCERTAINTY, AND OPPORTUNITY between finance and labor relations at every level of the economy: the macroeconomy, industries, firm, and households. It also discusses the role of a variety of financial products, such as individual retirement savings plans, stock options, private equity investments, and consumer credit, in shaping the increasingly tight relationship between finance and labor relations. This volume further provides a sense of the dual nature of finance in labor relations—the growing risks to and potential opportunities for economic security—when discussing employee ownership, socially responsible investing, and income diversification. It also illustrates that the growing influence of finance on labor relations is not limited to the United State but plays out in different ways in other parts of the world. Finally, many chapters draw important policy lessons from research, demonstrating that the relationship between finance and labor relations and the consequences of this relationship can change. In other words, this research volume covers a lot of important ground and serves as an entry point to scholars, teachers, activists, and neutrals interested in learning more about the link between finance and labor relations. I should note that our understanding of the complex nature of the growing role of finance in labor relations is still evolving as new financial products become available, different parts of the economy adopt new financial services, and regulations introduced in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2007 through 2009 take shape. Several chapters hence address emerging topics that will likely need further research by inter- ested scholars. This applies in varying degrees to Sara Bernardo’s chapter on the link between household debt and labor market uncertainty; to Janet Boguslaw and Alexander Kaufman’s chapter on targeted investments such as socially responsible investing and pension fund activism; and to the work of Hina Sheikh, Stephen Lerner, and Rita Berlofa on organizing financial service workers in the United States and Brazil—as well as to my own chapter, co-authored with Jeffrey Wenger, on the need for and lack of income diversification for vulnerable households. Other chapters, in comparison, are more definitive: they are the culmination of long-standing research projects, often spanning decades of the lead researchers’ expertise. Examples here include William Lazonick’s chapter on the changing nature of labor amid new managerial orientations, Rosemary Batt and Eileen Appelbaum’s work on private equity; Joseph Blasi, Richard Freeman, and Douglas Kruse’s research on employee ownership; and Edward Wolff’s insights on the link between individual retirement savings and wealth inequality. Accordingly, this research volume gives readers a sense of the tremendous work that scholars have already undertaken to get a handle on how finance affects labor relations as well as on the many emerging and still-developing research questions. INTRODUCTION 3 I have organized this research volume in the following way: