Governance Matters The Great Recession and Compensation Practices: New Rules for Compensation?

This article introduces the Governance Matters essays for this issue. It discusses the Great Recession and its effects on Labor Relations and Collective Bargaining and the effects of these on compensation practices in State and Local Governments. The Great Recession is an enduring event in American government and politics. It has had marked impact on the structure and operations of State and Local government especially on budgets. Given, the large proportion of state and local government budgets devoted to compensation the Great Recession’s economic and political effects may be greatest there. This article asks of the essays, whether changes in labor relations and collective bargaining due to the Great Recession are changing the rules for government compensation practices at the state and local level in the U.S. It concludes that they are, but the durability of these rule changes and the political impact is yet to be determined. Keywords Great Recession, ‘‘double dip’ ’ recession, state and local governments Governance Matters has looked at the effects of the ‘‘Great Recession,’ ’ as it has come to b