Classification of factors determining price rigidities, 474. — Characteristics of the product, 476. — Law or administrative decree, 481. — Concentration of control, 482. — Marketing techniques, 484. — Habits and customs, 486. — Contractual arrangements, 486. — Structure of the market, 487. — Conclusions, 488.

Although Means had compiled concentration and data for 94 industries, he based his conclusions on the chart covering 37 industries reproduced by Blair (page 427). Actually, in the original study,3 price data in relation to Census classification were considered adequate or fair for 7I industries serving national markets and for I3 industries serving other types of markets; data were poor for only 9 industries.4 In his presentation, Dr. Blair omitted Rufus Tucker's classic commentary upon Means's chart: 5

mHE literature dealing with industry-wide or multi-employer bargaining associates this bargaining with various characteristics of industries. Factors that have been emphasized as conditioning the form of collective bargaining which has evolved include relative labor costs, nature of the product market, extent of competition, number of firms, nature of production process, structure of the union, etc. Many writers stress the significance of relatively high labor costs as a factor influencing the adoption of that type of collective bargaining.' Relatively high labor costs (as measured by the relationship of wages and salaries to total sales or value added by manufacture) are cited as a factor impelling employers to agree to multi-employer bargaining in order to equalize their competitive cost situation. The recent availability of the I947 Census of Manufactures makes it possible to check the accuracy of this widely held assumption, as well as other economic characteristics of industries which practice multi-employer bargaining. These Census data can be applied to the industries which the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has classified as bargaining through associations or by groups of employees.2 The present article proposes to relate relative wage costs in terms of value added by manufacture and value of product shipped to various types of multi-employer bargaining and to company-wide bargaining. Table i shows the experience in I947 for industries with multiemployer bargaining; and Table 2 shows the relationships for industries using company-wide bargaining. Do the industries with multi-employer bargaining have higher relative wage costs than those with company-wide bargaining or than the average for all manufacturing industries where such over-all data are available? The BLS tabulation of industries with multiemployer bargaining includes both manufacturing and nonmanufacturing industries. Census data, however, have not been made available for nonmanufacturing industries since I939. Hence, for those industries, I939 data had to be used. These industries were:

Introduction: characteristics of the industry, 18. — The time-schedule of control, 20. — Organization and administration of control, 22. — Maximum prices: virgin aluminum, 26; aluminum alloy, 27; secondary aluminum, 28; aluminum scrap, 28. — Aluminum and other non-ferrous metal prices, 29. — Maintenance and expansion of supply, 32. — Collection and utilization of scrap, 38. — Appeal to housewives, 39. — Control over demand, 41. — Summary and conclusions, 46.

The change from a peace to a war-time economy, 211. — Scope of the present study, 212. — Pre-war preparations for control, 212. — The time schedule of war control, 214. — Methods of control: maximum prices, 216; priorities, 218; supply controls, 219; licenses, 222. — Organization and administration of control, 222. — Problems of control, 224. — Personnel, 225. — Priorities, 226. — Business practices, 228. — The London Metal Exchange, 230. — Small firms, 231. — Scrap metal, 232. — Administration of the control, 235. — Conclusions, 237.

ONE of the outstanding developments in collective bargaining in I948 was the General Motors contract with the United Automobile Workers.' Two phases of this contract led to considerable discussion: (a) the cost of living adjustment clause and (b) the annual improvement factor for each of the two years for which the contract was drawn. Cost of living clauses are not unique in labor contracts.2 The inclusion of an annual improvement factor in the collective bargaining contract, however, did represent a significant departure from past practice. Under the General Motors' formula, provision was made for an annual improvement factor of 3 cents an hour in I948 and an increase of the same amount in May I949, in addition to adjustments required to meet changes in living costs. Since at the time the contract was signed, the average hourly rate for General Motors was about $1.50, the rate of improvement provided was about 2 per cent a year. The General Motors' rate of increase apparently was based on the long-term national average increases in output per man-hour.