Task Structure as a Source of Organizational Inequality
Name
uniontasks6.pdf
Description
Accepted version
Size
1.44 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
7a86086b7f5ed7cb375ac9c85b1e2960
Author(s)
Wilmers, Nathan
Alternative Title
Job Turf or Variety: Task Structure as a Source of Organizational Inequality
Date Issued
February 2020
Journal
Administrative Science Quarterly
Publisher
SAGE Publications
Citation
Wilmers, Nathan. "Job Turf or Variety: Task Structure as a Source of Organizational Inequality." Administrative Science Quarterly 65, 4 (February 2020): 1018-1057 © 2020 The Author(s)
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
What explains pay inequality among coworkers? Theories of organizational influence on inequality emphasize the effects of formal hierarchy. But restructuring, firm flattening, and individualized pay setting have challenged the relevance of these structuralist theories. I propose a new organizational theory of differences in pay, focused on task structure and the horizontal division of labor across jobs. When organizations specialize jobs, they reduce the variety of tasks performed by some workers. In doing so they leave exclusive job turf to other coworkers, who capture the learning and discretion associated with performing a distinct task. The division of labor thus erodes pay premiums for some workers while advantaging others through job turf. I test this theory with linked employer–employee panel data from U.S. labor unions, which include a type of data that is rarely collected: annual reporting on work tasks. Results show that reducing task variety lowers workers’ earnings, while increasing job turf raises earnings. When organizations reduce task variety for some workers, they increase job turf for others. Without assuming fixed job hierarchies and pay rates, interdependencies in organizational task allocation yield unequal pay premiums among coworkers.
MIT Department
Sloan School of Management
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1177/0001839220909101
