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Wages, unions, and labour productivity: evidence from Indian cotton mills

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  • BISHNUPRIYA GUPTA

Abstract

type="main" xml:lang="en"> Clark and Wolcott attribute the low productivity of Indian cotton textile workers to their preference for low work effort, and suggest that unions resisted an increase in work intensity. This article argues that low wages were due to surplus labour in agriculture. Low wages allowed the persistence of managerial inefficiencies and resulted in low productivity and work effort. It uses firm-level data from all the textile producing regions in India to examine the relationship between unions and labour productivity. The findings show that fewer workers were employed per machine in the unionized mills in Bombay and Ahmedabad, compared to the mills in less unionized regions. These findings suggest that unionization increased wages and compelled managers to raise productivity

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  • Bishnupriya Gupta, 2011. "Wages, unions, and labour productivity: evidence from Indian cotton mills," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64, pages 76-98, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ehsrev:v:64:y:2011:i::p:76-98
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    Cited by:

    1. Gupta, Bishnupriya, 2014. "Discrimination or Social Networks? Industrial Investment in Colonial India," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(1), pages 141-168, March.
    2. Tirthankar Roy, 2017. "The Origins of Import Substituting Industrialization in India," Economic History of Developing Regions, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(1), pages 71-95, January.
    3. J.A. Zumoff, 2016. "‘Is America afraid of the truth?’ The aborted North American trip of Shapuriji Saklatvala, MP," The Indian Economic & Social History Review, , vol. 53(3), pages 405-447, July.
    4. K. Shanmugan & Bhagirath Prakash Baria, 2019. "Agricultural Labour Productivity and Its Determinants in India," The Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer;The Indian Society of Labour Economics (ISLE), vol. 62(3), pages 431-449, September.

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