Reconversion and the Origin of Bargained Plans

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. McCarthy
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Pension Plans ◽  
Occupational Pension ◽  
Labor Management ◽  
Private Pensions ◽  
Congress Of Industrial Organizations ◽  
Policy Interventions ◽  
Industrial Organizations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Pension Benefits

This chapter offers a explanation of the proliferation of occupational pension plans after World War II. Principally, it shows that private pension development was neither the result of policy interventions before the end of the war nor the simple result of union strength in postwar collective bargaining disputes. Instead, the turn to occupational pensions was caused by policymakers intervening in labor-management disputes—not principally to compel businesses to adopt occupational pension plans, but rather to establish labor peace in order to capture capitalist growth opportunities abroad. The chapter begins by considering why the Congress of Industrial Organizations was unable to expand the pension benefits offered by the Social Security program after the New Deal, roughly between 1939 and 1968, before turning to the expansion of private pensions.

As Furious as the Last Horseman of a Legion of the Bitter-End

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Ritterhouse
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Iron And Steel ◽  
Racial Change ◽  
White Southerners ◽  
Congress Of Industrial Organizations ◽  
Industrial Organizations ◽  
United Mine Workers ◽  
Interracial Unionism ◽  
United Mine

This chapter centers on Daniels's interviews with Birmingham industrialist Charles F. DeBardeleben and labor organizer William Mitch of the United Mine Workers (UMW) and Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). DeBardeleben's biography begins with his grandfather, Daniel Pratt, and his father, Henry Fairchild DeBardeleben. Both were industrialists whose investments in coal, iron, and steel contributed to the development of Birmingham. Charles F. DeBardeleben followed in his father's footsteps as a staunch antiunionist. He claimed to be a paternalist yet used fences and armed guards to isolate his workers, resulting in a deadly shooting at the Acmar mine of his Alabama Fuel and Iron Company in 1935. Meanwhile, the passage of the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) in 1933 facilitated the growth of the CIO, and William Mitch's efforts to cultivate interracial unionism in Birmingham in the 1930s were largely successful. The chapter concludes by noting that DeBardeleben's alleged fascist ties are difficult to document and seem less significant than his anticommunist rhetoric and switch to the Republican Party, both of which provide an early glimpse of tactics recalcitrant white southerners would employ to prevent social and racial change in the post-World War II years.

Silver Lining

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lon Kurashige
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Labor Union ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Transitional Period ◽  
Congress Of Industrial Organizations ◽  
Industrial Organizations ◽  
Asian Immigration ◽  
Institute Of Pacific Relations ◽  
Silver Lining ◽  
The U.S

This chapter focuses on the debate over Asian immigration exclusion between the enactment of Japanese exclusion and World War II. During this time, prominent opponents of Japanese exclusion shifted tactics to clear up racial and international misunderstanding through scholarly research, educational initiatives, and campaigns to repeal Japanese exclusion. They did this mainly through the establishment of two institutions: Survey of Race Relations at Stanford University and the Institute of Pacific Relations, initially based in Hawaii. At the same time, proponents of Japanese exclusion moved on to push for the exclusion of Filipino immigrants and the repatriation of those already in the U.S. This was achieved, but only by Congress granting independence to the U.S. colony of the Philippines. Egalitarian views of Filipinos, Japanese, and other Asian immigrant groups gained support within a new and powerful national labor union, the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). Despite the continuation of Asian exclusion, the 1930s was a transitional period in which new opportunities and institutions emerged to combat it.

Individual pension-related risk propensities: the effects of socio-demographic characteristics and a spousal pension entitlement on risk attitudes

2008 ◽  
Vol 28 (6) ◽  
pp. 847-874 ◽  
Author(s):  
GORDON L. CLARK ◽  
KENDRA STRAUSS
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Status ◽  
Adult Population ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Plans ◽  
Demographic Characteristics ◽  
Risk Attitudes ◽  
Occupational Pension ◽  
Related Risk ◽  
The Social

ABSTRACTThe transition from defined-benefit to defined-contribution occupational-pension plans has placed a premium on the participants' or contributors' decision-making competence. Their attitudes to risk and their responses to available investment options can have far-reaching implications for their retirement income. Behavioural research on risk and uncertainty has raised understanding of the limits of individual decision-making, but the social status and demographic characteristics of plan participants may also affect risk perception and pension choices. By studying a random sample of the British adult population, this paper explores the significance of socio-demographic characteristics for pension-related risk attitudes. It is demonstrated that pension-plan participants do not appear to understand the risks associated with different types of retirement savings and pension plans. The paper also shows that the gender, age and income of plan participants can give rise to distinctive risk propensities, and that marital status and, in particular, whether a spouse also has a pension can also have significant consequences for household risk preferences. These results have implications for those segments of the population that are disadvantaged in the labour market. Employer-provided pensions' education and information programmes may have to be more basic and more closely tailored to the social status of pension plan participants than hitherto assumed or hoped.

“Striking Deaths” at their Roots: Assaying the Social Determinants of Extreme Labor-Management Violence in US Labor History—1877–1947

2014 ◽  
Vol 38 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 541-575
Author(s):  
Paul F. Lipold
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Labor History ◽  
The United States ◽  
Organized Labor ◽  
World War ◽  
Labor Management ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Unique Data ◽  
The Social

The seven decades framed by the Great Railway Strike of 1877 and institutionalization of organized labor in the wake of World War II constituted a unique period of US labor relations, one that labor historians have identified as the most violent and bloody of any Western industrialized nation. Despite long-standing scholarly interest in the issues of labor-management conflict, however, important questions regarding the causes of extreme labor-management violence within the United States have never been adequately addressed. In this paper, I utilize a recently compiled and unique data set of American strike fatalities to statistically model the causes of extreme strike violence in the United States. The time-series evidence suggests that picket-line violence increased in association with (1) the struggle for and against unionization and (2) economic desperation associated with tightening labor markets. The results also both depict the stultifying effect of massacres and suggest that state support for labor's right to organize tended to decrease the likelihood of violence and vice versa. This paper not only thus provides fresh insights into classic questions, but also offers a basis for both transhistorical and international comparison.

Private pensions and government guarantees: clues from Canada

2007 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
NORMA L. NIELSON ◽  
DAVID K. W. CHAN
Keyword(s):  
Interest Rates ◽  
Pension Plans ◽  
Pension Benefit ◽  
Tax Rates ◽  
Private Pensions ◽  
Deferred Compensation ◽  
Canadian Data ◽  
Government Guarantee ◽  
Pension Benefits ◽  
Rare Opportunity

The Pension Benefits Guarantee Fund (PBGF) was established in the province of Ontario in 1980, thus creating in Canada a rare opportunity for intranational empirical research on the impacts of governmental protection on private plans and their participants. This paper examines Canadian data on pension plans for effects attributable to Ontario's government guarantees for some plans. We find that significant variables related to an increase in the number of pension plans in Canada are higher interest rates, a larger labour market, and, consistent with the deferred compensation theory from labour economics, lower real disposable income of workers. The number of members in pension plans is related significantly to the same variables and also to tax rates and unemployment. The analyses show that the Ontario environment for pension plans is significantly different from the rest of Canada. Those plans covered by the Pension Benefit Guarantee Fund exhibit a lower degree of funding per participant than do the remainder of the plans in the sample, supporting the argument that a government guarantee is related to a moral hazard problem in Ontario pension financing.

scholarly journals Which Norwegian Enterprises Offer the Poorest and the Best Pension Entitlements?

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tove Midtsundstad
Keyword(s):  
Labor Market ◽  
Private Sector ◽  
Pension System ◽  
Social Partner ◽  
Occupational Pension ◽  
Occupational Pensions ◽  
National Insurance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Partner Relations ◽  
Pension Benefits

The National Insurance Scheme (NIS) remains the cornerstone of the Norwegian pension system. The introduction of a mandatory occupational pension in 2006, and the restructuring of the contractual pension (AFP) in 2008, have, however, significantly increased the importance of labor market based pensions. Entitlement to AFP and contributions to occupational pensions are largely determined by individual employers, thus resulting in significant different future pension benefits and opportunities to retire early among employees. This article investigates what characterizes private sector enterprises that offer their employees both entitlement to AFP and a ‘good’ occupational pension, compared with enterprises that only offer a minimum pension. Analyzing data from a survey carried out in 2012 among 1107 private sector companies, I find that companies who offered an occupational pension before such schemes became mandatory in 2006 and companies where the social partners had conducted negotiations concerning pensions, were more likely to offer ‘good’ labor market based pensions. Both of these factors are linked to union strength and strong social partner relations.

Liberalism Transformed

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Schickler
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
The Political ◽  
Congress Of Industrial Organizations ◽  
Political Work ◽  
Industrial Organizations ◽  
Fair Employment ◽  
The Military

This chapter explores the deepening and consolidation of ideological changes as support for civil rights became a defining commitment of a more robust liberal coalition in the 1940s. African American movement activists capitalized on the World War II crisis to force new civil rights issues onto the political agenda—such as fair employment practices and discrimination in the military—and to forge a much broader civil rights coalition. After the war, continued movement activism laid the groundwork for the dramatic fight over the Democratic platform at the convention in 1948. Ultimately, the political work by African American groups, in cooperation with the Congress of Industrial Organizations and other urban liberals, fostered a new understanding of “liberalism” in which support for civil rights was a key marker of one's identity as a liberal.

“Like a Scab over an Infected Sore”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Phillips
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
York City ◽  
World War ◽  
Congress Of Industrial Organizations ◽  
Industrial Organizations ◽  
Labor Legislation ◽  
National Congress

This chapter explores the challenges Local 65 faced during World War II and in the immediate postwar months. The union lost thousands of members as well as its catch-all focus during the war. Jack Paley, Esther Letz, and the “65ers” who led the union in their absence gained valuable experience working with the National War Labor Board (NWLB) and campaigning for pro-labor legislation, but freely admitted that they failed to continue to organize as effectively. Furthermore, because of the “pro-Soviet” positions it had taken during the war, the union had begun to lose credibility with other New York City locals and the national Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).

Dismantling Solidarity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. McCarthy
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Pension System ◽  
Pension Plans ◽  
Private Pension ◽  
Structural Factors ◽  
Occupational Pension ◽  
Retirement Plans ◽  
Historical Factors ◽  
Welfare Change ◽  
Structural Mechanisms

Why has old-age security become less solidaristic and increasingly tied to risky capitalist markets? Drawing on rich archival data that covers more than fifty years of American history, this book argues that the critical driver was policymakers' reactions to capitalist crises and their political imperative to promote capitalist growth. Pension development has followed three paths of marketization in America since the New Deal, each distinct but converging: occupational pension plans were adopted as an alternative to real increases in Social Security benefits after World War II; private pension assets were then financialized and invested into the stock market; and, since the 1970s, traditional pension plans have come to be replaced with riskier retirement plans. Comparing each episode of change, the book mounts a forceful challenge to common understandings of America's private pension system and offers an alternative political economy of the welfare state. The book weaves together a theoretical framework that helps to explain pension marketization with structural mechanisms that push policymakers to intervene to promote capitalist growth and avoid capitalist crises and contingent historical factors that both drive them to intervene in the particular ways they do and shape how their interventions bear on welfare change. By emphasizing the capitalist context in which policymaking occurs, the book turns our attention to the structural factors that drive policy change. The book urges the reader to reconsider how capitalism itself constrains policymaking.

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