ABSTRACT

The concept of an employee exercising voice in an employment relationship is as old as the concept of a free labor market (Smith 1776). In such a market, individual employees exchange their labor for compensation and other rewards. If dissatisfied with one or another aspect of his/her employment relationship, an employee may voice such dissatisfaction and seek to have it redressed. An employee may also quit a job with his/her present employer and take a presumably more utility-enhancing job elsewhere. Similarly, an employer who is dissatisfied with the performance of an employee may discipline that employee, including ultimately by firing the employee. An employer may also lay off employees—in contemporary parlance, reduce the work force—due to a decline in demand for the company’s products or services, substitution of capital and/or technology for labor, organizational restructuring, and other factors.