The Prices and Incomes Accord: Its significance, impact and legacy

Abstract

This thematic section of the Journal of Industrial Relations commemorates the 30th anniversary of the Prices and Incomes Accord between the Hawke–Keating government and the Australian Council of Trade Unions. The Accord remains a landmark by the standards of Australian industrial relations history and given the international context in which it emerged. It achieved its initial objective of addressing the problem of ‘stagflation’ and helped to facilitate structural reform in the Australian economy. In gaining cooperation from unions and by providing a social wage to cushion workers from the adverse effects of economic and wages policy reform, the Accord represented a more equitable alternative to neoliberal approaches adopted elsewhere. However, negative unintended consequences of the Accord years remain features of the contemporary labour market, which casts some doubt on its legacy.