Streamlining enterprise agreements to reduce complexity: An empirical assessment

Since the advent of enterprise bargaining more than two decades ago, both Coalition and Labor Governments haveexhorted the bargaining parties to create simple, streamlined agreements to facilitate communication of workplaceentitlements and obligations to employers and workers. This study empirically examines the texts of enterpriseagreements to investigate the impact of this policy of simplicity on the level of detail (density) in agreements made inthe higher education and fast food sectors between 1993 and 2014. The empirical findings point to divergent trendsacross the two sectors: whereas fast food agreements became slightly more streamlined, the density of higher educationagreements has nearly doubled over the time period. The analysis suggests that regulatory changes have had someinfluence on these shifts, particularly the changes to the benchmarks that were designed to protect workers fromdisadvantage and the brief introduction of extensive restrictions on content. To some extent, the divergent trends in thetwo sectors may be explained by the strong union presence in the higher education sector (and a corresponding absencein the fast food sector) and the efforts of unions to protect and improve upon existing employee entitlements. Thissuggests that simplicity sometimes comes at a cost of fairness for employees. While simplicity should not trumpfairness as a policy goal, it is important that the goals of simplicity and fairness are not seen as mutually exclusive. It isof course possible to retain and expand upon worker benefits in enterprise agreements, while at the same timeconsolidating the expression of those benefits to ensure that agreements do not become increasingly dense over time.