Using panel data for nearly all service providers in a single industry sector, we examine productivity responses to changes in competition in the United States. The sector offers workplace employee representation through trade union branches which compete with one another for union members whose...

We show that an institutional change designed expressly to heighten competition for the provision of union services can have a substantial effect on unionization and employment relations. We study a French reform of 2008 that introduced mandatory elections for representation of workers at firm,...