When Rock Island railroadmen complained about their corncob-filled caboose mattresses half a century ago, they unknowingly baptized a working practice that is as old as man's labor and as fresh as this week's news. Chided the trainmaster: "What do you wantfeatherbeds?" Since then, featherbeddingthe purposeful slowing down or spreading out of work to make jobshas become one of the most emotion-packed points of dispute between U.S.
management and labor. Today the practice pads U.S. labor costs by more than $1 billion a year, plagues a broad spectrum of industries ranging from...