Contribution #10: Labor Unions and Collective Bargaining in the NFL

Reading about Labor Unions in Chapter 14 only increased my own premonitions about what is going to happen to the NFL. The book talks about how effective labor unions have the power to bargain in relation to management. The right to strike is a power tool of labor unions, but it has to be a collective idea from the labor force. In the case of the NFL, the players have a high magnitude of bargaining power over the management because of the costs that are imposed on management without viable labor. While it is true that labor costs in the NFL are going up, I find it hard to believe that the owners of teams will be willing to sit on all the costs of stadiums and not make money for an entire season. Considering that the NFL’s Player Association is so large, owners would also have a hard time finding a quality product that people would still want to watch on Sundays. However, this is where labor relations and collective bargaining gets exciting. The players also know that they would rather play football than bag groceries or be a gym teacher, so they have to find some middle ground to help decrease costs of the owners, whose ultimate goal is to make themselves filthy rich. Another thing to take away from this Chapter is the negotiation process. I view the process as a form of distributive bargaining because the union wants a larger share of the pie, but management also wants to reduce costs because they say they are too much of their profits. My guess is that this will turn into some form of integrative bargaining where players will get more pay, while rookie’s pay will be drastically reduced. That type of agreement might be enough of a middle ground for the owners as well as the players in relieving some of the pressure in agreeing to a new collective bargaining agreement. However, if the owners want to move to an 18-game schedule then they better be prepared to increase wages or else find another incentive for players to make them feel like the beating they take is worth it.