Peter B. Doeringer

This book gives the findings of a concise study of start-up factories in the United States by Japanese companies. This in-depth look at this increased phenomenon discusses not only the quality of jobs these factories produce, but it also expands to reveal their keys to success in achieving a strong competitive advantage. Finally, this volume gives the four inter-related strategies ( high performance management strategy, the economics of efficient wages, the quality of technology plants and regional economic development) that make for successful, high performance factories.

This book deals with critical issues resulting from the impact of corporate restructuring on workers. U.S. industry has undergone a shakeout resulting from increasing competitive pressures and the globalization of production. As a result, some two million workers have been laid-off from their employers. Individual chapters have been drafted by an interdisciplinary group of academics who explore seven key areas: demographic changes of younger and older workers, workforce displacement from lay-offs, human resources planning for downsizing and mergers, technological change, changes in the roles of unions, changes in managerial and professional work, and `contingent' and flexible employment. The drafts of the chapters have been extensively edited and, in some cases, rewritten so that the book will read more like a series of chapters than a group of papers. The work was commissioned by the National Planning Association who will be a party to the contract.

This book provides a description of a number of institutional features of the U.S. labor market and prompts an analytical debate about the origins of the institutions it describes and their significance for the operation of the U.S. economic system.

This book provides a description of a number of institutional features of the U.S. labor market and prompts an analytical debate about the origins of the institutions it describes and their significance for the operation of the U.S. economic system.