Collective Bargaining

Collective bargaining is a process by which individual workers combine to negotiate with an opposing party (usually an employer or employer group). The object of collective bargaining is for the workers to gain strength through numbers. The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA or “Wagner Act”) sets out mandatory subjects of collective bargaining, which must be discussed between the workers' representative (the union, if the employer's workers are [Page 83]unionized) and the employer. The mandatory subjects of bargaining are wages, hours, and working conditions.