Heterogeneous Matching, Transferable Utility and Labor Market Outcomes

A model of the labor market under search frictions is developed, where participants are heterogeneous with respect to their productivity types and the individual decision of which type of agents to match with is endogenized. Wages are negotiated, so that all gains from trade are exploited. This has important implications for the equilibrium outcomes. In particular, two applications are studied. It is observed that countries with high (low) unemployment tend to exhibit low (high) wage dispersion. And there is evidence showing that individual and Þrm characteristics have more explanatory power for the French than for the American wage data. The model is able to replicate these two observations, underscoring the relevance of considering matching patterns between heterogeneous agents in the different economies. Since the model does not feature a minimum wage, I thus provide a theory of endogenous wage compression. JEL ClassiÞcation Codes: E24, J31, J41, J64 ∗I wish to thank Jack Barron, Ken Burdett, Gabriele Camera, David Hummels, Mark McMullen, Peter Rangazas, Richard Rogerson, Katsuya Takii and Randall Wright, as well as participants at the 2000 Midwest Macro Meetings, the 2000 World Congress of the Econometric Society, IUPUI, Purdue University and the University of Kentucky for helpful comments. Of course, all errors remain mine. †E-mail: [email protected]