Monopsony and labour demand

‘Monopsony and Labour Demand’ might strike many as a contradiction in terms as monopsony is often thought to mean an outcome on the labour supply and not the labour demand curve. This paper argues that, despite initial appearances to the contrary, there is no inevitable contradiction between the view that employers have some monopsony power over their workers and the enormous literature on the economics of labour demand. Indeed, popular models of ‘labour demand’ with convex costs of adjustment are really better thought of as models of monopsonistic firms. But the ‘labour demand’ literature could do with some re-focusing as the study of the wage and employment decisions of employers.