IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp7870.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Chinese Unions and Enterprises Performance

Author

Listed:
  • Fang, Tony

    (Memorial University of Newfoundland)

  • Ge, Ying

    (School of International Trade and Economics, Beijing)

Abstract

This paper uses the national firm level survey data to investigate the effects of Chinese unions on firm performance. We show that Chinese unions have a strong "State-Party voice" face and a "collective voice" face but lack of "monopoly" face. The government influence plays an important role in unionization. The empirical findings on the effectiveness of unions are remarkable: unions in the workplace significantly improve productivity but reduce enterprise profitability. Moreover, the presence of unions in same region and industry generates negative spillovers on enterprise performance.

Suggested Citation

  • Fang, Tony & Ge, Ying, 2013. "Chinese Unions and Enterprises Performance," IZA Discussion Papers 7870, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7870
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp7870.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard B. Freeman, 2005. "What Do Unions Do?-- The 2004 M-Brane Stringtwister Edition," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 26(4), pages 641-668, November.
    2. Lu, Yi & Tao, Zhigang & Wang, Yijiang, 2010. "Union effects on performance and employment relations: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 202-210, March.
    3. Sergio Godoy & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 2007. "Growth, Initial Conditions, Law and Speed of Privatization in Transition Countries: 11 Years Later," Studies in Economic Transition, in: Saul Estrin & Grzegorz W. Kolodko & Milica Uvalic (ed.), Transition and Beyond, chapter 4, pages 89-117, Palgrave Macmillan.
    4. Hirsch, Barry T, 1991. "Union Coverage and Profitability among U.S. Firms," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(1), pages 69-77, February.
    5. Fang, Tony & Ge, Ying, 2012. "Unions and firm innovation in China: Synergy or strife?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 170-180.
    6. Malcolm Warner & Ng Sek-Hong, 1999. "Collective Contracts in Chinese Enterprises: A New Brand of Collective Bargaining under ‘Market Socialism’?," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 37(2), pages 295-314, June.
    7. Simon Clarke & Chang‐Hee Lee & Qi Li, 2004. "Collective Consultation and Industrial Relations in China," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 42(2), pages 235-254, June.
    8. John T. Addison & Claus Schnabel (ed.), 2003. "International Handbook of Trade Unions," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2705.
    9. Mark Doms & Eric J. Bartelsman, 2000. "Understanding Productivity: Lessons from Longitudinal Microdata," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(3), pages 569-594, September.
    10. David G. Blanchflower & Alex Bryson, 2004. "What Effect Do Unions Have on Wages Now and Would Freeman and Medoff Be Surprised?," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 25(3), pages 383-414, July.
    11. Barry T. Hirsch, 2004. "What Do Unions Do for Economic Performance?," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 25(3), pages 415-456, July.
    12. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2004. "What Unions Do: Insights from Economic Theory," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 25(3), pages 351-382, July.
    13. John W. Budd, 2004. "Non-Wage Forms of Compensation," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 25(4), pages 597-622, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Song, Yang & Yang, Jidong & Yang, Qijing, 2016. "Do firms' political connections depress the union wage effect? Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 183-198.
    2. Laureen Albarrán Díaz de León & Jerjes Aguirre Ochoa, 2014. "Analyzing Organized Crime From A Business Perspective: The Case Of Mexican Meth Mafia," International Journal of Asian Social Science, Asian Economic and Social Society, vol. 4(9), pages 977-990, September.
    3. Riedel, Nadine & Stüber, Robert, 2019. "Overearning – Revisited," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 75(PA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tony Fang & Ying Ge & Youqing Fan, 2019. "Unions and the productivity performance of multinational enterprises: evidence from China," Asian Business & Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 18(4), pages 281-300, September.
    2. Ying Ge, 2014. "Do Chinese Unions Have “Real” Effects On Employee Compensation?," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 32(1), pages 187-202, January.
    3. Dong, Zhiqiang & Luo, Zijun & Wei, Xiahai, 2016. "Social insurance with Chinese characteristics: The role of communist party in private firms," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 40-51.
    4. Laroche, Patrice, 2020. "Unions, Collective Bargaining and Firm Performance," GLO Discussion Paper Series 728, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    5. Fang, Tony & Ge, Ying, 2012. "Unions and firm innovation in China: Synergy or strife?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 170-180.
    6. Chang Hee Lee & Mingwei Liu, 2011. "Collective Bargaining in Transition: Measuring the Effects of Collective Voice in China," Chapters, in: Susan Hayter (ed.), The Role of Collective Bargaining in the Global Economy, chapter 8, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Richard B. Freeman, 2005. "What Do Unions Do?-- The 2004 M-Brane Stringtwister Edition," Journal of Labor Research, Transaction Publishers, vol. 26(4), pages 641-668, November.
    8. Blanchflower, David G., 2006. "A Cross-Country Study of Union Membership," IZA Discussion Papers 2016, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Cardullo, Gabriele & Conti, Maurizio & Sulis, Giovanni, 2015. "Sunk capital, unions and the hold-up problem: Theory and evidence from cross-country sectoral data," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 253-274.
    10. repec:ilr:articl:v:65:y:2012:i:2:p:263-285 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Pierre Brochu & Louis-Philippe Morin, 2011. "Union Membership and Perceived Job Insecurity: 30 Years of Evidence from the American General social Survey," Working Papers 1106E, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    12. Pierre Brochu & Louis-Philippe Morin, 2012. "Union Membership and Perceived Job Insecurity: Thirty Years of Evidence from the American General Social Survey," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 65(2), pages 263-285, April.
    13. Elisabetta Magnani & David Prentice, 2010. "Outsourcing And Unionization: A Tale Of Misallocated (Resistance) Resources," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 48(2), pages 460-482, April.
    14. Devicienti, Francesco & Manello, Alessandro & Vannoni, Davide, 2017. "Technical efficiency, unions and decentralized labor contracts," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 260(3), pages 1129-1141.
    15. Antonioli, Davide & Mazzanti, Massimiliano, 2017. "Towards a green economy through innovations: The role of trade union involvement," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 286-299.
    16. Lu, Yi & Tao, Zhigang & Wang, Yijiang, 2010. "Union effects on performance and employment relations: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 202-210, March.
    17. Barry T. Hirsch, 2008. "Sluggish Institutions in a Dynamic World: Can Unions and Industrial Competition Coexist?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(1), pages 153-176, Winter.
    18. David G. Blanchflower & Alex Bryson, 2022. "Union Membership Peaks in Midlife," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 60(1), pages 124-151, March.
    19. Berlemann, Michael & Zimmermann, Klaus W., 2010. "They don't get me I'm part of the union: Trade unions in the German parliament," HWWI Research Papers 2-16, Hamburg Institute of International Economics (HWWI).
    20. Patrice Laroche & Heidi Wechtler, 2011. "The Effects of Labor Unions on Workplace Performance: New Evidence from France," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 32(2), pages 157-180, June.
    21. Magali Jaoul-Grammare & Isabelle Terraz, 2013. "A Causality Analysis of Economic Growth and Union Density in European Countries," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 27(4), pages 421-442, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    unions; laws; productivity; profitability; China;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J51 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Trade Unions: Objectives, Structure, and Effects
    • J52 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Dispute Resolution: Strikes, Arbitration, and Mediation
    • J53 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Labor-Management Relations; Industrial Jurisprudence

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7870. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.