ABSTRACT
Examination of legal and economic literature reveals two different views of job-transactions. The prevailing legal concept seems to be that the job is a contractual relationship between two individuals having an equal footing before the law. Courts and attorneys seem to visualize the worker in a world of equal legal opportunities, whereas the worker experiences only unequal, limited economic opportunities. Conformity to the common rules of the market was obtained by the moral sanction of threatening offenders with the ill-will of fellow workers or fellow employers, or by the economic sanction of withholding the privileges of the job or of the continued service of employees. This is a task requiring intimate knowledge of the industry and of the psychology of employers and employees. This process of extra-legal or extra-judicial adjustment of employer—employee relations rests on a fundamental difference between commodity-transactions and job-transactions.
