This paper looks at public and private sector wages interactions since the 1960s in the euro area, euro area countries and a number of other OECD countries. The paper reports, first, a strong positive annual contemporaneous correlation of public and private sector wages over the business cycle;...

This paper develops a dynamic general equilibrium model in which the public and the private sector interact in the labor market. Previous studies that analyze the labor market effects of public sector employment and wages have mostly assumed exogenous rules for public wage and public employment....