Tre strejker i det offentlige - en komparativ lønmodtager-investeringsanalyse

From April to June 2008, three groups of public sector employees – nurses,
social care assistants and kindergarten teachers – went on strike in order to try to
improve their relative wage gains, the strikes lasting between four and eight weeks.
Did this pay off? On the basis of an investment calculus, we show that only a well-prepared
and relatively short strike with substantial gains may succeed in a positive payoff
(as was the case for the social care assistants). Small gains or a more protracted
strike (the latter due to the lack of will to compromise) lead to negative payoffs of a
significant magnitude. In fact, we can show that the latter two groups will need 10
(nurses) or 15 (kindergarten teachers) years respectively to recoup the costs to their
strike funds.