| Author: | Cheung, Moon-wah |
| Title: | Two-tier wages and organizational justice : a study of social workers in Hong Kong |
| Degree: | D.B.A. |
| Year: | 2006 |
| Subject: | Social workers -- China -- Hong Kong -- Attitudes. Organizational justice -- China -- Hong Kong -- Case studies. Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations. Social workers -- Salaries, etc. -- China -- Hong Kong. |
| Department: | Graduate School of Business |
| Pages: | xiv, 206 leaves : ill. ; 31 cm. |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | Two-tier wage structures have been increasingly adopted as a common practice since the early 1980's as a result of internal and external pressures on both the business and non-profit sectors to effect basic changes in industrial relations and to control labor costs. Prior literature has indicated that two-tier wage structures have negative effects on employee outcomes. However, there are several shortcomings in this literature. First, prior studies of two-tier wage structures only reflect distributive justice, neglecting the possible effects of procedural and interpersonal aspects of two-tier wage structures. Second, prior studies take no account of possible contingent effects in determining outcomes. Third, to my knowledge, there have not been any studies of two-tier wage structures in Hong Kong, and this study is first of this kind in the social work profession. This study incorporated a social exchange perspective to examine the relationship between two-tier wage structures and justice perceptions, the interactive effects of interactional justice and value orientation, and their subsequent effects on employee attitudes and behaviors. By using a field study to test hypotheses through a questionnaire survey in a non-contrived setting, this study adopted a multi-source approach to measure the variables at interest to alleviate common method variance. Findings suggested that low-tier status has a negative effect on pay satisfaction; distributive justice and procedural justice mediate directly or indirectly the effects of tier status on employees' pay satisfaction, job satisfaction, turnover intention and organizational commitment; interactional justice exerts contingent effect on IRB, when interacting with distributive justice, and altruism motivation modifies the effect of procedural justice on job satisfaction. Post hoc analyses also indicated that while distributive justice and procedural justice have potent effects on employee attitudes, interactional justice makes significant impact on both attitude and behavior outcomes of employees. This study makes a contribution in two dimensions. Theoretically, adopting a social exchange approach, this study has established a compelling theoretical framework to explain the effects of two-tier wage structures on employee outcomes from an organizational justice perspective. Moreover, the findings of the interactive effects of interactional justice and altruism motivation strengthen the explaining power of organizational justice. Practically, the findings provide seasoned information that is valuable for NGO's management to make informed decision and the recommendations may help them develop their own mitigation policy on the implementation of two-tier wage structures. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| b20889537.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 21.42 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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