The Friedman Doctrine in 1970 begat the shareholder supremacy movement in the 1980s, which begat an unraveling of all the old norms concerning loyalty and decency of businesses toward employees. Loyalty implies treating employees better than the law requires, which was at odds with the new mandates of shareholder supremacy. Replacing strikers was a shock-and-awe swerve, outsourcing work to low-wage contractors a less dramatic form of cold-bloodedness. Both were highly effective means of scaring workers in order to reduce their power and keep their pay lower.
