ALBERT

Notes: The United Nations' newly completed study of purchasing power parities covering 34 countries varied in region, income level, and form of economic organization shows the systematic differences between the usual view of the structure of the world economy arising out of international comparisons based upon foreign exchange rate conversions and the structure one sees when actual prices are available.The real per capita GDP of developing countries is understated relative to developed countries when exchange rates are used in converting countries' national income accounts to a common currency, with the degree of understatement for any two countries being inversely related to the per capita income difference between them. The reason for this is that relative prices in the non-traded goods sector are lower relative to traded goods prices in low income countries. The systematic pattern observed in the 1975 data of the 34 countries has been extrapolated over time and space to get estimates of GDP for other years and countries.In the absence of detailed price data, the real shares of final expenditures devoted to particular components of the total can only be estimated as the proportion of own currency total expenditure devoted to the components. The observed differences in the pattern of prices of poor countries relative to rich for different components makes this clearly wrong for international comparisons, and in systematic ways. For example, (i) the relative price of services compared with commodities in poor countries is lower than in rich; so the apparent tendency of the share of services to rise as a country's income rises disappears when real quantities are considered; similarly, (ii) the relative price of capital goods is greater in poor countries compared with rich ones, so the difference in investment ratios out of GDP between rich and poor countries is understated.

Notes: The change in goods and services available in a national economy brought about by the shifting of external price relationships is referred to as the terms of trade effects. This paper reviews the various methods which have been devised since the war to define and quantify such effects on the Gross National Product. The statistical annex shows that, as far as OECD countries are concerned, the differences between the various measures are not significant. Whereas the effects from terms of trade represented, on average, less than one half of one percent of the GNP of OECD countries during the 1960's the percentage has increased substantially since 1973, due most importantly to the increase in the oil price; by 1977 (on a 1970 price basis), it had reached 5 percent of GNP in Japan and up to 6 percent in Italy. On the other hand, the extreme case of Saudi Arabia where various formulas generate effects amounting to between one half and the whole of GNP, indicates that the measurement of terms of trade effects by various methods may give different results.

Notes: The concern with income distribution has always mainly existed because of a concern with individuals' economic welfare. In recent years, the question has arisen whether the distribution of annual income—the distribution most often studied—is the best proxy for the distribution of economic welfare. Other measures, such as lifetime income, have been proposed instead.The paper starts with a discussion of how to define and measure the distribution of lifetime income. By using a simulation model, which partly consists of estimated functions and partly of tax functions taken directly from tax laws, distributions of lifetime income, variously defined, are then constructed. These distributions are compared with each other, and with distributions of annual income. The simulations indicate that the distribution of lifetime income is considerably less unequal than the distribution of annual income. Whether inheritances are included or not seems to be of no importance for the inequality of lifetime income. If, on the other hand, we include the value of leisure time in lifetime income, inequality increases by about 10–15 percent. Distributions of income after tax have Gini coefficients which are approximately 25 percent less than the Ginis for the before-tax distributions. We thus find that the picture of inequality we get is very much dependent on which income concept we use.

Notes: This paper discusses the history of the French development of satellite accounts during the late 1960s and 1970s, noting the circumstances that led to the initiation of work in this area and describing the types of problem encountered. It then goes on to draw, on the basis of the French experiment, more general conclusions and to present a proposed accounting framework. The final section considers the concept of social expenditure, but concludes that, at least for the present, it is not possible to construct a useful global concept.

Notes: The economy of Liberia is one in which, in spite of past satisfactory growth performance, a high level of income inequality persists. In 1977, for instance, a mere 2 percent of the people accounted for some 33 percent of nation-wide wage income. These people live disproportionately in Montserrado County in which the capital city is located. While each of the other counties are largely rural and poor, each has far lower intra-county inequality than wealthy Montserrado.Intersectoral location of the income-earner, average income levels and the extent of access to human capital formation opportunities are some characteristics of the economy that have been found to explain significant portions of intercounty variations in the levels of household income concentration. Income inequality is reduced with increases in the extent of agricultural activity as the share of the top income group falls and that of the bottom group rises. The reverse happens with growing urban-area activity. Higher income concentration occurs with rising per capita incomes as the top group's income share rises and the bottom income group's share falls. While this appears to be an instance of the Kuznet U-shaped hypothesis, here there are no definite signs of a possible reversal any time soon. The levels of access to educational facilities move inversely with the level of inequality, with expanding elementary facilities benefiting the poorer people at the expense of the wealthy while the reverse happens in the case of expanding secondary educational facilities.

Notes: This article describes what happens to income distribution during intensive changes in gross domestic product due to external market conditions. It deals specifically with an open market petroleum-based economy, Trinidad and Tobago, and reviews changes in national product and income levels and the income distribution pattern over the twenty year period 1957–76.The paper argues that during the period characterized by subperiods of steady growth and rapid growth in GDP (the latter associated with the petroleum price rise), income inequality increased between 1957 and 1972 and then decreased in the post petroleum-price-rise period of rapid growth 1973–76. While the effect of intensive changes in national product did trickle down to the lower income groups, income inequality in 1975–76 was greater than that existing in 1957–58. An examination of the spatial, occupational and temporal aspect of the distribution pattern points towards the elimination of structural dualism in the economy as the surest path towards greater income equality in Trinidad and Tobago.

Notes: The debate on how to deal with changes of relative prices in national accounts has, so far, remained inconclusive, especially with regard to the question of how to measure gains from changes of terms of trade. Keeping the experiences of the 1970s in mind (i.e. substantial changes of relative prices sparked off by increased oil prices), this state of affairs is not considered tenable.On this background, the paper takes up the old debate on how to deflate figures of domestic product, total as well as by industries. It tries to argue that deflated figures should be presented not only as real product figures by industries (using the double deflation method), but also as real income figures, obtained by deflating the current-prices figures of a certain year by the same general price index. When this is done according to procedures spelled out in detail, gains/losses from changes of the terms of trade in foreign trade will show up as an integral part of the framework.In the paper, special attention is given to the concept of industry terms of trade. On the basis of simplifying assumptions (which are, however, relaxed in the final part of the paper), it is shown how the ratio of real income divided by real product of a certain industry will be proportionate to the terms of trade of the industry concerned, when the latter concept is defined in the appropriate way. Furthermore, the sum of the industry gains/losses from changes of their terms of trade will be equal to the gain/loss of the economy taken as a whole from changes of the terms of trade in foreign trade.

Notes: In this paper, I investigate the validity of the Modigliani-Brumberg (M-B) model as an explanation of the variation of wealth holdings among households. The model as such, even with the inclusion of estimates of household lifetime earnings, explains only a minute portion of the variation in household wealth. Indeed, for certain groups such as non-white, rural residents, and the low educated, the coefficients of the regression model are insignificant. Moreover, when the top wealth holders are removed from the sample and when non-cash financial and business assets are eliminated from the household portfolios, the explanatory power of the M-B model increases markedly. Essentially, the validity of life-cycle wealth accumulation models must be restricted to the white, urban, educated middle classes and their accumulation of housing, durables, and cash. The rich have very different motives for saving and very different sources of saving, while the poor do not earn sufficient income over their lifetime to accumulate any non-negligible wealth.

Notes: This paper presents an analysis of the distributive impact of government expenditures in the United States. The analysis uses a household-level microdata file drawn from the 1970 U.S. Census of Population, with additional income and tax variables drawn from the Internal Revenue Service 1969—70 Tax File.The results are presented at both federal and local levels and include analyses of the distribution of individual benefits, as well as of overall taxes and net benefits. Since a microdata file was used, distributional effects are examined with respect not only to the “traditional” variables of income class and household size, but also with regard to the number of earners in the household and the sex and race of the household head.In a further paper in a subsequent issue of this review we will present the results of a similar analysis for the United Kingdom, and compare the results for the two countries.

Notes: In an important recent book dealing with the measurement of income inequality with particular reference to poverty,1 Prof. N. Kakwani derives several poverty indices, investigates the effect of negative income tax schemes with the help of those indices and gives a numerical illustration based on Malaysian data.The aim of this note is to point out some logical flaws in his argument. Some of the ideas expressed in the part of his book we are concerned with have been disseminated for some time now2 and referred to in subsequent literature;3 yet their shortcomings do not seem to have attracted anyone's attention. The introductory section gives a concise presentation of the relevant part of Kakwani's contribution. The next two sections deal with some problems with his approach.

Notes: The conceptual framework of the system specifies that societal resources are limited by two basic factors: the amount of available human time, and the stock of wealth inherited from the past. Wealth is defined very broadly to cover not only the conventional tangible capital assets familiar to economists, but also intangible human and other capital assets, stocks of organizational capital reflected by networks of social support systems (the family, the neighbourhood), stocks of environmental assets (the sun and air), and stocks of socio-political assets (security, freedom of choice). Human time covers market work, household production, leisure, and biological maintenance.Human time and capital stocks are used within households to produce a variety of tangible and intangible outputs, and these outputs in turn are used to produce a variety of satisfactions (utilities) or to augment stocks of capital, or both.The basic sources of well-being in the system are ultimately of two types: well-being is produced as a consequence of the intrinsic benefits from all activities engaged in by individuals, which is to say that people have preferences over the way they spend their time; secondly, people derive utilities from the existence of various stocks or states of society, and these satisfactions are independent of the way in which time is used. The satisfactions associated with flows of goods are subsumed by satisfactions derived from activities associated with those goods.The system contains a set of linkages among the various parts:inputs of goods and time are used to produce tangible household output, using the familiar notions of household production functions and constrained optimization; tangible household products, which are intermediate in the system, are used in conjunction with human time to produce direct satisfactions or to augment household capital stocks; both household (micro) and societal (macro) capital stocks are linked directly to psychological well-being; household activities are linked directly to flows of satisfactions, termed process benefits in the system; household preferences and values relating to policy variables are linked to public policies of various sorts, and policies modify the constraints and opportunities relevant for household decisions.The system also has dynamic linkages. Modifications of household or public stocks produce impacts on future flows of well-being; satisfactions from activities may adapt to the existence of constraints, hence changes in constraints can modify preferences and subsequently modify activities; and household behavior has a life-cycle dimension which is inherently dynamic.

Notes: In the United States, the life-cycle relationship between initial Social Security contributions and subsequent benefits causes the effect of Social Security on income distribution to be overestimated in a single-period analytical framework. By separating the annuity from the redistributive aspects of Social Security we provide a life-cycle framework for measuring its net effect on redistribution. To this point in its history, we find all income classes have received positive net life-cycle income transfers and, in an absolute sense, upper-income groups have done at least as well as lower-income groups. This suggests a reason for the near-universal support of Social Security by past generations, as well as the controversy which now surrounds it. As it becomes apparent to younger cohorts of taxpayers that many of them will be net losers, it is inevitable that Social Security will be subject to the same controversy as other welfare programs which attempt to redistribute income.

Notes: Using data from the 1973 National Survey of Family Growth, the present study analyzes, for blacks and whites separately, the impact of female market activity on the inequality of the income distribution among households. The family life cycle is divided into three stages, according to the presence and age of children: (1) the interval between marriage and the birth of the first child, (2) the child-rearing interval, and (3) a final period which begins when all the children have reached school age. Using the coefficient of variation as an indicator of inequality, the empirical results show that in period 1, the contribution of white working wives has a large equalizing impact, while that of their black counterparts results in a slight increase in dispersion. In the child-rearing and post child-rearing stages, the labor supply of mothers decreases family income inequality by a small amount for both black and white households. A decomposition of the squared coefficient of variation of family income is presented to aid in the interpretation of these findings.

Notes: Although national and sector balance sheets have long been regarded as part of the national accounting framework, for a variety of reasons their compilation by official statisticians has been the exception rather than the rule. A programme of balance sheet work in the United Kingdom Central Statistical Office has recently been completed and the results published. The theoretical and practical problems arising in the course of this work are described and discussed. Summary results are given together with an interpretation of the main changes in the sectoral composition of national wealth between 1957 and 1975.

Notes: This paper presents an analysis of the distributive impact of public expenditures and taxes in the United Kingdom. The analysis uses household level microdata from the 1971 Family Expenditure Survey, with tax and expenditure aggregates drawn from the national accounts.The analysis is the first to allocate all taxes and public expenditures for the United Kingdom, and the results are compared to those from the more restricted analyses carried out by the U.K. Central Statistical Office. Results are presented for individual taxes and benefits as well as for overall net benefits and they describe distributional effects with respect to income class, household size, number of earners and housing tenure.A final section of the paper compares the results to those from a similar analysis for the United States which were reported in the previous issue of this review.

Notes: This paper considers the impact upon measures of corporate income of a number of concepts of the maintenance of the existing capital of an incorporated trading enterprise. A main distinction is drawn between the maintenance of all the assets employed in trading and the maintenance of the net assets attributable to the owners. Measures of income and of rates of return to capital depend on whether all the assets, or only the net assets attributable to the owners, are being considered. There are three sections of the paper after an introduction. Section 2 is conceptual and section 3 illustrates the concepts, with figures for U.K. manufacturing industry in 1975 to 1977, in which the figures in company balance sheets are adjusted from book values to estimated replacement cost, and estimates are made of depreciation at replacement cost and of the consumption of stock (inventories) at replacement cost. These figures follow the concept of maintaining physical assests. I have added calculations which extend the concept of capital maintenance to all operating or trading assets, including monetary working capital; and which then calculate the amounts necessary to maintain the assets attributable to the owners of a business. The three main methods are: to apply a gearing adjustment to abate the additional capital maintenance provisions for operating assets (which are realized revaluations by reference to their original cost); to take into income additionally the geared (or debt financed) portion of unrealized revaluations; and-what is conceptually much the same thing-to count as the charge for debt only real interest (which may be negative) rather than nominal interest. Section 4 considers some problems of aggregation, particularly the derivation of aggregates for the sectors of the economy, when based on figures for individual enterprises using the various approaches to capital maintenance.

Notes: Expanded measures of government output include imputed values of the services of government capital, uncompensated factor services of military draftees and jurors, and net revaluations, as well as the usually included compensation of employees. The government output is allocated to consumption, capital formation and product intermediate to other sectors, on the basis of its classification in ten broad functions: defense, space research, education, health, sanitation, transportation, parks and recreation, natural resources, welfare, and general administration. Final government product in 1976, including $116 billion in defense and $125 billion in education, amounted to $450.5 billion, which was 26.5 percent of the 1976 GNP. This final government product corresponded to the BEA measure of $191.6 billion.Total capital formation related to government is defined to include both government product which enters into capital formation in other sectors and government expenditures for its own capital accumulation. After a more rapid rate of growth in previous years, this total government capital formation in the United States in 1976 is found to exceed gross private domestic investment. A significant but only minor portion was found to be constituted by government expenditures for capital goods and change in government inventories. Investment in research and development, health and, particularly, education and training, were dominant components in capital formation related to government.

Notes: This paper focuses on the use of statistical matching in the estimation and analysis of the size distribution of family unit personal income. The paper begins with a brief discussion of data on the size distribution of income in the U.S. and their limitations. Several methods of improving or augmenting those data are described, and earlier examples of statistical matching for that purpose are mentioned. A brief summary of the types of statistical matching methods which have been used is also presented. Then a recent example of statistical matching carried out at the Office of Research and Statistics, Social Security Administration, is described, and the effects on the size distribution of adjusting and augmenting the initial data using the statistically matched data from that example are shown. Material relating to the accuracy of that statistical match is presented in the appendix.

Notes: This article presents the results of the first French efforts to assemble information on the assets and liabilities of the different economic agents. The estimates cover the five-year period 1972–76, with complete balance sheets for the end of 1971, 1972, and 1976. The experimental efforts showed that estimation was feasible. It was possible to bring together the varied, often dispersed, and rarely consistent existing information into an integrated body of aggregates adapted to macroeconomic analysis. The report stresses the importance of articulating the wealth accounts logically with the flow accounts, into a complete, closed, and consistent whole in which the theoretical objectives are well specified. It also points out the limitations of the approach, stemming primarily from the state of the basic statistics relating to wealth.

Notes: This paper is concerned with the distribution of wealth in Sweden in 1975 and its development during the period 1920–75. The paper is based on a large study on wealth undertaken for the Swedish Commission on Wage-Earners and Capital Formation. The first report from this study was presented in 1979 as a book in Swedish: Roland Spånt, Den svenska förmögenhetsfördelningens utveckling (The Development of the Distribution of Wealth in Sweden), SOU 1979:9. That first report will also be published in English. Prior to that the main results can be found in this paper.During 1980–81 we intend to publish specific reports on the distribution of shareholding, the effects of inflation, the development of the distribution of wealth 1975–78, the importance of pension rights etc.

Notes: Present national accounting conventions regarding the treatment of flows and stocks in the petroleum sector are considered to be unsatisfactory. But changes in reporting requirements for oil and gas producers open up possibilities for a more satisfactory treatment.In this article some aspects of the newly adopted requirements are presented and the possible uses of the additional information available for improving social accounts are discussed.

Notes: Book reviewed in this article:Cedric Sandford et al, Costs and Benefits of VAT

Notes: In this article the author describes workplace communities in British hotels and discusses the relationships between the workplace community and employees' subculture, family life and leisure patterns. He also discusses the role of the workplace community as an alternative to bureaucratic organisation and the consequences for people of working in a leisure context.

Notes: The currently high level of unemployment emphasises the importance (in policy terms) of the potential contribution of a self employment alternative. Here the author examines the available UK evidence on the degree of movement from unemployment to self employment, the factors influencing this movement and the role of labour market information and training.

Notes: Explanations for the pattern of strike activity in British coal mining have focused upon the industry's changing economic fortunes or developments in its collective bargaining structure. The author examines these explanations and suggests four additional factors that account for the trend of coal mining strikes.

Notes: Some recent developments in the case-law on unfair dismissal and industrial action are outlined. The author suggests that these decisions put the statutory provisions out of step with the broad intention behind legislation.

Notes: The Government's continuing difficulties in controlling the money supply and determination to use cash limits to control the level of public sector pay settlements have renewed cause for a return to a form of incomes policy covering both the public and private sectors. In this article Brian Towers examines the nature of incomes policy and the importance of comparability and collective bargaining structure in its implementation and discusses the form which a viable future policy should take.

Notes: The emergence of the APT can be seen almost as a textbook illustration of a breakaway union. This article analyses reasons for its emergence and its impact upon the traditional union for polytechnic lecturers, the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education.

Notes: The purpose of this article is to assess recent developments in Mitbestimmung within the Federal Republic, to analyse the role which codetermination plays in the German firm and economy, to examine the attitudes of German management and labor toward the system, and to speculate about possible future changes in the laws regarding labor participation.

Notes: The system of pay bargaining in local government has been subjected to conflicting pressures, both from employers and trade unions, since the second half of the 1970s. The author argues that these difficulties will intensify under the increasing financial stress which local government is experiencing.

Notes: During the 1970s West German social scientists began to pay more attention to the strike phenomenon. In this article the author reviews recent research contributions in the Federal Republic and analyses the quantitative and qualitative aspects of strikes over the last thirty years.

Notes: The authors report a study into the impact of the former Labour Government's industrial relations legislation, much of which remains on the statute book. They focus on joint health and safety committees and provide a useful starting point for further research concerned to develop a model of firm response to industrial relations legislation in any particular subject area.

Notes: Robert Buchanan examines the numbers, membership and main characteristics of the unions involved in mergers between 1949 and 1979, considers the main reasons for this trend in mergers, and compares it with the earlier merger movement occurring between 1911 and 1922.

Notes: Paul Blyton reports a study of patterns of behaviour from observation of sixteen white-collar shop steward committee meetings. The results show that the stewards' position in the work hierarchy influences the extent and form of their contribution within the meetings: those from senior work positions were more active than their lower grade counterparts.

Notes: Worker co-operatives have been the subject of extensive debate in recent years. In this article John Coyne and Nick Wilson place that attention in perspective by outlining the different forms worker co-operatives take. They review recent initiatives to promote cooperative development and discuss the ensuing problems facing the emergent co-operative.

Notes: Norman Leckie, Gordon Betcherman and Keith Newton show the value of a multi-disciplinary approach in the empirical explanation of voluntary separation rates in organisations.

Notes: An analysis of the proposals leading to the Employment Act was featured in IRJ Volume 11 Number 2 (May/June 1980). Several changes were made to the Employment Bill in its passage through Parliament. Karl Mackie outlines the provisions of the Act in this commentary.

Notes: Warwick University, the main UK centre for industrial relations research, with a well-established teaching programme, has developed an important collection of books and other materials on industrial relations themes. Although designed primarily for academics, the library resources and facilities are also available to industrial relations specialists in industry.

Notes: Book reviewed in this article:Numbers Racket
 Richard A. Easterlin, Birth and Fortune: The Impact of Numbers on Personal Welfare.The Decision to Work
 James P. Smith, ed., Female Labor Supply: Theory and Estimation.The Character of a People
 Solomon B. Levine and Hisashi Kawada, Human Resources in Japanese Industrial Development.Beyond Nine to Five
 Sarah Fenstermaker Berk, ed., Women and Household LaborOwner's Manual
 Karen R. Polenske, The U.S. Multiregional Input-Output Accounts and Model.Collective Concerns
 Scott Cummings, ed., Self-Help in Urban America: Patterns of Minority Business Enterprise.St. Louis Blues
 Eugene I. Meehan, The Quality of Federal Policymaking: Programmed Failure in Public Housing.The Hard-Soft Path
 Gregory A. Daneke and George K. Lagassa, eds., Energy Policy and Public Administration.Also of Interest
 Ralph Andreano and John J. Siegfried, eds., The Economics of Crime.Regina Belz Armstrong et al., Regional Accounts: Structure and Performance of the New York Region's Economy in the Seventies, ed. Boris S. Pushkarev and Peter J. Bearse.Malcolm Gillis and Ralph E. Beak, Tax and Investment Policies for Hard Minerals: Public and Multinational Enterprises in Indonesia.Arthur P. Solomon, ed., The Prospective City: Economic, Population, Energy, and Environmental Developments.George Sternlieb, James W. Hughes, et al., America's Housing: Prospects and Problems.Edward L. Ullman, Geography as Spatial Interaction, ed.

Notes: In this article the author argues that while it is desirable to seek an early return to economic expansion and to control the rate of inflation these should not be seen as solutions to the unemployment problem. He advocates an approach which he describes as ‘long term, low cost, group specific, net job creation’.

Notes: In the light of the currently prevalent view that shop stewards are becoming more involved in trade union government, the author suggests that we look more carefully at unverified assumptions of shop steward incorporation.

Notes: In this article the author, using case study material, considers the motives which induce individuals either to join associations or to free-ride. In particular, he concludes that analysis and thinking on the free-rider problem needs to be pursued in a specific, well defined manner.

Notes: Book Reviewed in This Article: LABOUR RELATIONS IN ADVANCED INDUSTRIAL SOCIETIES: ISSUES AND PROBLEMS Edited by B. Martin and E. M. Kassalow STATE-OWNED ENTERPRISE IN THE WESTERN ECONOMIES Edited by R. Vernon and Y. Aharoni, Croom Helm THE LAST COLONY: BUT WHOSE? H. A. Turner, et al. AUSTRALIAN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS D. Plowman, S. Deery, C. EUROPEAN LABOR RELATIONS: TEXTS & CASES Thomas Kennedy

Notes: In this article the author assesses the difficulties facing democracy in the British Retail Co-operative Movement, with special reference to the role of employees on boards of directors.

Notes: While there is ambivalence towards the new technology within the trade union movement, the general belief is that - provided its introduction is controlled by collective bargaining and sympathetic government action - it will lead to increased leisure and higher living standards. The author suggests that the ‘silicon dream’ is more likely to become a nightmare.

Notes: The role of the shop steward in Australian industrial relations is probably as important as that of his British counterpart. In this article the author uses the three types of shop steward described by Miller and Form: management, union and employee oriented, to analyse a survey of 260 shop stewards in Western Australia.

Notes: Richard Rosenberg and Eliezer Rosenstein compare Yugoslavian workers' councils with consultative participation in US plants. They conclude that shopfloor participation offers the most potential for active worker involvement in management and even for the effective downward transfer of decision-making authority.

Notes: With the post-war breakdown of the industrial relations consensus ‘the trade union question’ has been central to British politics. In this article, the authors argue that no settlement will be lightly achieved and that it will require detailed policies based on radical principles. The alternative is a continuation of the long drawn out crisis until sectional demands and strife provoke increasing forms of state control.

Notes: Book reviews in this article: EUROPEAN INSIGHTS: MANPOWEREdited by Barrie O. Pettman, WORKERS AND EMPLOYERS: DOCUMENTS ON TRADE UNIONS AND INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS IN BRITAIN SINCE THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURYJ. T. Ward and W. Hamish Fraser (eds.), INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS IN THE NHS—THE SEARCH FOR A SYSTEM Nick Bosanquet(ed.), STRIKES IN BRITAIN C. T. B. Smith, Richard Clifton, Peter Makeham, S. W. Creigh and R. V. Burn, MORE BAD NEWSGlasgow University Media Group, Routledge and Kegan Paul MANAGING AND DEVELOPING NEW FORMS OF WORK ORGANISATIONG. Kanawaty (ed.), NEW FORMS OF WORK ORGANISATION 1 NEW FORMS OF WORK ORGANISATION 2 INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR: THE FIREMEN N. F. Dufty,

Notes: Book reviews in this article:Incomplete Picture Victor L. Arnold, ed., Alternatives to Confrontation: A National Policy toward Regional Change.Ladies’Room Gerda R. Wekerle, Rebecca Peterson, and David Morley, eds., New Space for Women.Speaking Fluidly Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Western Water Resources:Multilateral Monologues Alice H. Amsden, ed., The Economics of Women and Work. New York:To Plan or Not to Plan Joseph F. DiMento, The Consistency Doctrine and the Limits of Planning.Comprehensive Social Theory Walter Isard and Panagis Liossatos with Yoshigeto Kanemoto and Phyllis C. KanissGalvanized into Action Kai N. Lee and Donna Lee Klemka with Marion E. Marts, Electric Power and the Future of the Pacific Northwest. Seattle and London:Toil and Trouble Andrew Levison, The Full Employment Alternative. New York:Made in the U.S.A. Hsin-Min Tong, Plant Location Decisions of Foreign Manufacturing Investors.Also of Interest Peter Abelson, Cost Benefit Analysis and Environmental Boblems.Also of Interest Brian J. L. Berry and Lester P. Silverman, eds.,Also of Interest John Carney, Ray Hudson, and Jim Lewis, eds.Also of Interest Leslie Dienes and Theodore Shabad, The Soviet Energy System: Resource Use and Policies. New York:Also of Interest Thomas R. Dye and Virginia Gray, eds., The Determinants of Public Policy. Lexington, Mass.Also of Interest Stahrl W. Edmunds and Adam Z. Rose, eds.Also of Interest Thomas G. Rawski, China's Transition to Industrialism: Producer Goods and Economic Development in the Twentieth Century.

Notes: In this article, Phil Beaumont reports research findings from a questionnaire-based study of some of the more important aspects of the relationship between union-appointed safety representatives and their workforce constituencies.

Notes: Drawing from her experience of participant-observation in an electrical engineering factory Caroline White contributes to the debate on Britain's continuing industrial problems. She concludes that the fundamental opposition of capital and labour in the capitalistproduction process explains the failure to tap the workers' reservoir of both commitment and creativity.

Notes: In spite of the extensive coverage given to employee participation and industrial democracy, important areas have been neglected. Mick Marchington and Roger Armstrong gather evidence concerning shop steward involvement in participative bodies, in response to the absence of a comprehensive analysis of steward attitudes and behaviour to participative schemes.