Featherbedding

Not to be confused with Featherbed.

Featherbedding is the practice of hiring more workers than are needed to perform a given job, or to adopt work procedures which appear pointless, complex and time-consuming merely to employ additional workers.[1] The term "make-work" is sometimes used as a synonym for featherbedding.

The term "featherbedding" is usually used by management to describe behaviors and rules sought by workers.[2] The term may equally apply to mid- and upper-level management, particularly in regard to top-heavy and "bloated" levels of middle- and upper-level management.[3] Featherbedding has also been occasionally used to describe rent-seeking behavior by corporations in response to economic regulation.[4]

  1. ^ The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, 3rd ed., edited by E.D. Hirsch Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil, Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002. ISBN 0-618-22647-8
  2. ^ William Gomberg, "Featherbedding: An Assertion of Property Rights," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 333:1 (1961).
  3. ^ "Featherbedding Brass," Time, May 14, 1956; C.A. Myers, "Top Management Featherbedding?", Sloan Management Review, 24:4 (1983).
  4. ^ Jarita Duasa and Paul Mosley, "Capital Controls Re-examined: The Case for 'Smart' Controls," The World Economy, 29:9 (September 2006).