COMPETING MODELS OF UNION BEHAVIOR - EVIDENCE FROM JAPANESE PANEL DATA

This paper examines from an empirical standpoint the common view that Japanese unions value employment security more highly than other unions. The approach consists of applying standard models of union behavior to a panel of 150 large unionized manufacturing firms and comparing the results with the findings of similar research done in the United States and Britain. There are two main results. First, we find no evidence that Japanese unions have a stronger preference for employment security of their members. Second, there is little evidence that they bargain over the total number of employees. © 1990.