A well-supported conclusion of previous research is that displacement entails large and persistent costs for workers. It therefore seems reasonable to expect workers to try to anticipate and respond to the risk of displacement. Using 1983–93 data from the Panel Survey of Income Dynamics...

Do unions really impede manufacturers' output flexibility? If so, in what ways? The authors propose a methodology for quantifying George Stigler's concept of output flexibility, and for decomposing the effects of unionization on average cost differences between union and non-union plants. Using...

Input flexibility, as measured by the ability of firms to vary input demand in the face of changes in input prices, is an important dimension of labor market flexibility. Using a new dataset, the authors analyze the impact of unionization on input flexibility in U.S. manufacturing from 1973 to...