Boulwareism and Good Faith Collective Bargaining

The obligation to bargain collectively in good faith is imposed on both the employer and the representative of his employees by the National Labor Relations Act. Generally, some form of ask-and-bid bargaining is used to satisfy this statutory obligation. Since 1947, however, the General Electric Company has developed and used a bargaining technique known as Boulwareism, which, on its face, seems capable of achieving the same results as the ask-and-bid method, but in a more efficient manner. Nevertheless, the National Labor Relations Board recently found Boulwareism to be in violation of the duty to bargain in good faith.