As the politico-socio-economic strength of each party changes over time, collective bargaining outcomes will as well, enlarging or reducing the number and impact of featherbedding rules on the employer.
Seizing on economists' emphasis on power in the workplace, other social theorists conclude that featherbedding is a result of weak labor unions and unenforced and unprotected worker rights.
The government claimed that the union's traditional methods of protecting its members' work jurisdictional strikes, resistance to work-displacing technology, and featherbedding were illegal restraints of trade.
