How Restrictive Labor Policies Affect Teachers, Students, and Progressive Politics
Subsequent Statement of Responsibility
Henig, Jeffrey R.
.PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC
Name of Publisher, Distributor, etc.
Columbia University
Date of Publication, Distribution, etc.
2020
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION
Specific Material Designation and Extent of Item
192
DISSERTATION (THESIS) NOTE
Dissertation or thesis details and type of degree
Ph.D.
Body granting the degree
Columbia University
Text preceding or following the note
2020
SUMMARY OR ABSTRACT
Text of Note
The Janus v. AFCSME (2018) decision has fundamentally changed the institutional context for U.S. teachers' unions. Although this change has the potential to upend education politics and the labor movement more broadly, little research exists to help us predict and conceptualize the consequences of this change. To fill this gap, I first situate teachers' unions and recent efforts to weaken them within the broader history of the United States labor movement. I then exploit the different timing across states in the passage of restrictive labor policies in a differences-in-differences/event study framework to identify how exposure to a restrictive labor policy affects students, teachers, and progressive politics. I present evidence not only of the productive information sharing role that teachers' unions play via collective bargaining, but also of the slower and more incremental role of teachers' unions through their efforts at alliance building and political advocacy for social welfare policies via progressive coalition building.