XIII 
RESULTS: TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF 
EMPLOYMENT 
Generalizations as to the results attributable to the employee repre- 
sentation movement are precarious. Whatever be claimed as a result 
—be it desirable or otherwise—some one is likely to regard as an 
inevitable outcome of other causes. Employee representation, it is 
sometimes argued, has been but the immediate instrument, while 
inexorable economic law or the power of unionism—according to one’s 
personal bias—has been the fundamental, though possibly hidden 
cause. Where neither of these has seemed an appropriate explanation, 
the benevolent or malevolent purposes peculiar to the particular 
employer have been held accountable. That he has chosen to let it 
appear that the result was due to the operation of an employee repre- 
sentation plan has not altered the fact that the policy or practice would 
have been put into effect irrespective of any arrangement for discus- 
sing it with his employees. 
EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION AN IMPORTANT FACTOR 
There is some warrant for this view of the ineffectiveness of 
employee representation. Undoubtedly basic economic conditions, 
operative over wide areas, have accounted for the trend of wages, 
both up and down. On the other hand, strong trade unions have often 
secured results which have been important factors considered by 
establishments having employee representation. Wage agreements 
consummated between the United Mine Workers of America and opera- 
tors in the central competitive district are said to have been the basis 
upon which wage adjustments have been made by the Colorado Fuel 
and Iron Company.! A wage settlement between the New York 
Central Railroad and certain railroad brotherhoods was admittedly 
a factor, as we have seen, in determining the increase to conductors 
1 Selekman, B. M., and Van Kleeck, Mary, op. cit., Ch. XII. 
230