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What Do Bosses Really Do?

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  • Landes, David S.

Abstract

If employers make so much money, why don't workers hire machines and expertise and make the money instead? This question has generated a large body of writing, including Stephen Marglin's much-cited article “What Do Bosses Do?” Marglin draws on history to argue that the employer, who added nothing to technical efficiency, used specialization of tasks to divide labor and impose himself as boss, thereby creating an artificial, unproductive role. These arrangements were embodied in domestic industry and were reinforced when employers turned to the factory system as a more effective disciplinary mode. This article argues that such a thesis misreads history and is essentially ideological.

Suggested Citation

  • Landes, David S., 1986. "What Do Bosses Really Do?," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(3), pages 585-623, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:46:y:1986:i:03:p:585-623_04
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    Cited by:

    1. Raghuram G. Rajan & Luigi Zingales, 2001. "The Firm as a Dedicated Hierarchy: A Theory of the Origins and Growth of Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(3), pages 805-851.
    2. Richard Langlois, 2013. "The Institutional Revolution: A review essay," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 26(4), pages 383-395, December.
    3. Bryer, R. A., 2005. "A Marxist accounting history of the British industrial revolution: a review of evidence and suggestions for research," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 25-65, January.
    4. Roger Strange, 2011. "The outsourcing of primary activities: theoretical analysis and propositions," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 15(2), pages 249-269, May.
    5. Geraghty, Thomas M., 2007. "The factory system in the British industrial revolution: A complementarity thesis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(6), pages 1329-1350, August.
    6. Lambert, Thomas, 2016. "Monopoly Capital and Capitalist Management: Too Many Managers?," MPRA Paper 71988, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Tetsuji Okazaki, 2017. "Disentangling the Effects of Technological and Organizational Changes in the Rise of the Factory: The Case of the Japanese Fabric Industry, 1905-1914," CIGS Working Paper Series 17-006E, The Canon Institute for Global Studies.
    8. Mokyr, Joel, 2001. "The rise and fall of the factory system: technology, firms, and households since the industrial revolution," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 1-45, December.
    9. Peter Matthews, 2002. "Technological Unemployment: A New View," Middlebury College Working Paper Series 0212, Middlebury College, Department of Economics.
    10. Y. Joseph Lin, 1997. "Division of Labor in Teams," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(1), pages 403-423, June.
    11. Ferguson-Cradler, Gregory, 2020. "Ownership in the electricity market: Property, the firm, and the climate crisis," MPIfG Discussion Paper 20/5, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    12. André Cieplinski, 2017. "Employee Control, Work Content and Wages," Department of Economics University of Siena 775, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    13. Tetsuji Okazaki, 2021. "Disentangling the effects of technological and organizational changes during the rise of the factory: the case of the Japanese weaving industry, 1905−14," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(4), pages 976-1005, November.
    14. Trevor Griffiths & Philip Hunt & Patrick O’Brien, 2008. "Scottish, Irish, and imperial connections: Parliament, the three kingdoms, and the mechanization of cotton spinning in eighteenth‐century Britain1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 61(3), pages 625-650, August.
    15. Lambert, Thomas, 2018. "Big Business and Management: Too Many Bosses and Too Much Pay?," MPRA Paper 86406, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Tetsuji Okazaki, 2017. "Disentangling the Effects of Technological and Organizational Changes during the Rise of the Factory: The Case of the Japanese Weaving Industry, 1905-1914," CIRJE F-Series CIRJE-F-1055, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.
    17. Carliss Y. Baldwin, 2019. "Setting the stage for corporate headquarters: a technological explanation for the rise of modern industrial corporations," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 8(1), pages 1-16, December.
    18. Julio César Zuluaga, 2009. "La mano visible: un clásico por debatir en la historiografía empresarial colombiana," Revista de Economía Institucional, Universidad Externado de Colombia - Facultad de Economía, vol. 11(20), pages 453-459, January-J.
    19. Nicola De Liso, 2001. "Tecnologie dellÕinformazione e della comunicazione, terziarizzazione e nuova divisione del lavoro digitale," Moneta e Credito, Economia civile, vol. 54(216), pages 425-459.
    20. Bruno Tinel, 2004. "Que reste-t-il de la contribution d'Alchian et Demsetz à la théorie de l'entreprise ?," Post-Print halshs-00270895, HAL.
    21. Richard N. Langlois, 2003. "Strategy as economics versus economics as strategy," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(4), pages 283-290.
    22. von Tunzelmann, Nick, 2003. "Historical coevolution of governance and technology in the industrial revolutions," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 14(4), pages 365-384, December.
    23. Calabrese, Matteo & Van Leeuwen, Bas, 2023. "Socio-economic characteristics as determinants in the job market: The case of Piedmont in Italy (1867–2005)," MPRA Paper 119299, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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