Firm Size and Society: The Link Between Firm Size, Job Outcomes, and Political Attitudes

Given the recent reconcentration of the economy in many private industries, the impact of working in firms of different sizes on occupational and political outcomes is of renewed interest. Using micro-level data for the US and Germany, two most dissimilar cases in terms of labor market and political institutions, we show that large firms provide substantially more material and welfare benefits to their workers, while small firms are characterized by the highest job satisfaction and more harmonious relational dynamics. Workers in medium-sized firms appear to be “betwixt and between,” being worst off in many dimensions, thus contradicting utopias of medium-sized-firm capitalism. Within firms of similar size, we also document a significant polarization between employers’ and their employees’ job experiences and political views. Given the number of waking hours spent in the workplace, the firm, hitherto a neglected locus of social sorting and socialization through which the economy shapes society, should figure more prominently in economic sociology research.