"We feel like we're doing our part with the Project Labor Agreement," Power says. "It's kind of rubbing our face in it to have non-union labor working close to us."

Members say they feel betrayed by Harvard in some ways. "The Project Labor Agreement assures us more work and gives them a better price," says James M. Sharp, carpenter steward at the Hillel construction site.. "We try to bargain faithfully--I don't see it as so faithful on Harvard's part."

Union members further charge that equating union work with non-union work in terms of bidding price is deceptive. The additional wages paid to union members, they say, translate into better work and more efficient workplaces due to greater training by the union contractors.

"They will get better quality if they just hire union workers," says Bernadette Dixon, another member of Local 40. "I think they get less quality if they hire non-union workers. There are problems in the long run."

Some administrators disagree, saying that Harvard usually hires unions for jobs requiring more experience.

"I can't really tell you I've noticed any difference between union and non-union labor," says Zewinski. "Harvard hires contractors who know what they're doing."

Zewinski's first opinion is not borne out by an extensive nationwide study of union labor and productivity published in 1987.

The report's author, Steven G. Allen, a professor of economics at North Carolina State University, says that on private sector projects of more than 100,000 square feet, the productivity of union labor was 30 per cent higher than non-union labor, and productivity published in 1987.

It's hard to pin down the precise some of this--but if you talk to the people in the industry, they'll tell you it's the training of workers," he says.

Therefore, union members say, asking unions to compete on a perfectly equal basis with non-union firms for bids does not take the whole picture into account.

University officials, though, says that the unions can be more competitive in their pricing and must realize that management as well as unions are feeling a financial pinch.

"I think there have been some signal sent by some of the contractors in the area that they need to have a more progressive attitude in the unions toward competition Zewinski says.

"We want the flexibility of bidding with union and non-union firms," Demong why. "We make sure we get quality balanced with savings."

Union leaders say that kind of bidding process is unfair.

"Because non-union contractors by and large do not pay the same kind of benefits other people pay, we don't have a level playing field," says Power.