Last week, we solicited your questions for George Atallah, the assistant executive director of external affairs for the N.F.L. Players Association. You responded with typical vigor, and Atallah took the bait, answering the vast majority of your questions. Thanks to him and all of you.
George Atallah is the assistant executive director of external affairs for the N.F.L. Players Association, which means that he and his boss, DeMaurice Smith, are the top representatives for perhaps the most prominent labor union in history: NFL players.
Despite a friendly Congress and a pending labor bill, unions are under fire these days in Detroit and elsewhere — perhaps with good reason. A working paper by David Lee and Alexandre Mas finds that a successful unionization vote significantly decreases the market value of the company even absent changes in organizational performance. Lee and Mas run a policy simulation . . .
Safety is an all-too-familiar issue in the construction industry — workers in Las Vegas are striking over it; in April, New York’s building commissioner resigned in light of more than 26 construction worker deaths in the city this year. As for the two recent crane collapses in New York, Patrick Crean, a construction worker at the Freedom Tower site, suspects . . .
A modern variant of David versus Goliath is unfolding in academic economics. Ashwini Agrawal is David. He is a graduate student getting a Ph.D. at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. The A.F.L.-C.I.O. is Goliath. Here is the background, as I understand it: The A.F.L.-C.I.O. manages huge pension funds for its members. These pension funds are invested in . . .