Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers
We investigate how individual workers and local labour markets adjust over a long time period to a discrete and plausibly exogenous technological shock, namely the introduction of containerisation in the UK port industry. This technology, which was introduced rapidly between the mid-1960s and the l...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
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Wiley
2017
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/40156/ |
| _version_ | 1848795996493971456 |
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| author | El-Sahli, Zouheir Upward, Richard |
| author_facet | El-Sahli, Zouheir Upward, Richard |
| author_sort | El-Sahli, Zouheir |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | We investigate how individual workers and local labour markets adjust over a long time period to a discrete and plausibly exogenous technological shock, namely the introduction of containerisation in the UK port industry. This technology, which was introduced rapidly between the mid-1960s and the late-1970s, had dramatic consequences for specific occupations within the port industry. Using longitudinal micro-census data we follow dock-workers over a 40 year period and examine the long-run consequences of containerisation for patterns of employment, migration and mortality. The results show that the job guarantees negotiated by the unions protected dock-workers' employment until the guarantees were removed in 1989. A matched comparison of workers in comparable unskilled occupations reveals that, even after job guarantees were removed, dock-workers did not fare worse than the comparison group in terms of their labour market outcomes. Our results suggest that job guarantees provided a safety net which reduced the cost to workers of sudden technological change. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:40:58Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-40156 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:40:58Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-401562020-05-04T18:45:15Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/40156/ Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers El-Sahli, Zouheir Upward, Richard We investigate how individual workers and local labour markets adjust over a long time period to a discrete and plausibly exogenous technological shock, namely the introduction of containerisation in the UK port industry. This technology, which was introduced rapidly between the mid-1960s and the late-1970s, had dramatic consequences for specific occupations within the port industry. Using longitudinal micro-census data we follow dock-workers over a 40 year period and examine the long-run consequences of containerisation for patterns of employment, migration and mortality. The results show that the job guarantees negotiated by the unions protected dock-workers' employment until the guarantees were removed in 1989. A matched comparison of workers in comparable unskilled occupations reveals that, even after job guarantees were removed, dock-workers did not fare worse than the comparison group in terms of their labour market outcomes. Our results suggest that job guarantees provided a safety net which reduced the cost to workers of sudden technological change. Wiley 2017-05-09 Article PeerReviewed El-Sahli, Zouheir and Upward, Richard (2017) Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 55 (2). pp. 225-273. ISSN 1467-8543 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjir.12224/full doi:10.1111/bjir.12224 doi:10.1111/bjir.12224 |
| spellingShingle | El-Sahli, Zouheir Upward, Richard Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title | Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title_full | Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title_fullStr | Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title_full_unstemmed | Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title_short | Off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| title_sort | off the waterfront: the long-run impact of technological change on dock workers |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/40156/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/40156/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/40156/ |