Wages and the labour market

In contrast to the traditions of social science, the argument made here is that wage structures are not to be explained by reference to an underlying economic or social rationale through which they contribute to the efficient or smooth functioning of an economy or society. Theories of wages have overstressed coherence and functionality and underplayed conflict and contradictions and the scope for discretionary, random or opportunistic decisions. Wage structures have been held partially in check in the past by institutional and social processes which linked wages across the labour market. Many of these processes, from industry-level pay bargaining to concepts of fair wages, 'going rates' or the family wage, have disintegrated in the 1980s and 1990s. More attention needs to be paid to the role of wages in the redistribution of resources and to the need to re-regulate the labour market.