Essay

Arm's-Length Intimacy: Employment As Relationship

Author: Marion Crain (Washington University School of Law)

Abstract

This Essay presents the importance of reconceptualizing employment as a relationship regarding money and love. It discusses the work law that ignores the realities of interdependence and mutual investment, commitment to a model of employment as an arm's length, and impersonal cash-for-labor transactions. Furthermore, the law draws distinctions between relationships, transaction, and on justifying the differential legal regime.

Keywords: Industrial relations, Employment at will, Human capital, Intimacy (Psychology), Contracts, Law & economics, Collective bargaining, Employment terminations, Severance pay, Organizational behaviour, National Labor Relations Act

How to Cite: Crain, M. (2011) “Arm's-Length Intimacy: Employment As Relationship”, Washington University Journal of Law and Policy. 35(1).