The development and structure of labor markets in the Los Angeles furniture industry

This dissertation explores the development and structure of labor markets in the Los Angeles furniture industry. An enduring leitmotif of the development of Los Angeles has been racial and ethnic labor market segmentation. The growth of the Los Angeles furniture industry since the 1960s has been based upon the availability of Mexican immigrants and chicanos. The following questions are addressed: how did immigrant labor markets develop in the Los Angeles furniture industry? How has this influenced the industry's development? How are local labor markets in the furniture industry structured, with respect to job search and hiring, job segmentation, turnover, and earnings? Specifically, are low wages in the industry explained by the existence of high-turnover, flexible labor markets? To address these questions, primary information was gathered from surveys of Los Angeles furniture manufacturers. The most important secondary information was derived from the sample of Los Angeles furniture workers in the 1990 Public-Use Microdata Samples of the US Bureau of the Census. This research supports the following propositions. The "new" immigrants from Mexico are a permanent rather than temporary labor force. Immigrant social networks are the basis of job search and hiring in the furniture industry. The ethnic transition of labor supply in the Los Angeles furniture industry has resulted in a dramatic decline in the relative earnings of production workers in the industry since the 1970s, and contributed to sluggish growth in productivity and capital intensity. Finally, low wages in the furniture industry are explained by labor supply dynamics and labor regimes, rather than high-turnover flexible labor markets.