Estimating the Union/Non-Union Wage Differential: A Statistical Issue

Nominal Wage Flexibility in a Monetary Union

Membership in a monetary union reduces the possibilities to counteract fluctuations in productivity by monetary policy. One condition for entrance not to lead to adverse unemployment performance is that wages are flexible with respect to productivity. Here I show that, depending on workers’ risk aversion, the incentive for workers to choose more nominal wages flexibility may increase after entr...

"The Union Wage Effect Re-Examined"

The Union Wage Premium in the US and the UK

This paper presents evidence of both counter-cyclical and secular decline in the union membership wage premium in the US and the UK over the last couple of decades. The premium has fallen for most groups of workers, the main exception being public sector workers in the US. By the beginning of the 21 Century the premium remained substantial in the US but there was no premium for many workers in ...

Holdout threats of the union during wage bargaining

We investigate a wage bargaining between the union and the firm where the parties’ preferences are expressed by varying discount rates and the threat of the union is to be on go-slow instead of striking. First, we describe the attitude of the union as hostile or altruistic where a hostile union is on go-slow in every disagreement period and an altruistic union never threatens the firm and holds...

Regional Wage Differentiation and Wage Bargaining Systems in the European Union

The theoretical literature has argued that a centralized wage bargaining system may result in low regional wage differentiation and high regional unemployment differentials. The empirical literature has found that centralized wage bargaining leads to lower wage inequality for different skills, industries and population groups, but the evidence on its impact on regional wage differentiation is s...