In this paper, we investigate how changes in the skill mix of local labor supply are absorbed by the economy. We distinguish between three adjustment mechanisms: through factor prices, through an expansion in the size of those production units that use the more abundant skill group more...

This paper considers labor market adjustments following a large import shock in the German clothing industry caused by the phasing out of the Multi-Fibre Arrangement. Using the German shoe industry as a control group and administrative data, we study adjustments on the individual and firm level...

This paper uses an oligopoly model with heterogeneous firms to examine how an industry adjusts to rising import competition. The model predicts that in the short run the least efficient firms in the industry become inactive, surviving firms face a fall in output, mark-ups and profits, and the...

This paper evaluates the possible consequences of the forthcoming European and Monetary Union on wage behaviour. It will be shown that EMU does not influence wage policy directly, but rather indirectly through its implications on other areas of economic policy, predominantly on monetary policy....

This paper analyzes the interaction between structural change and labor market dynamics in West Germany, during a period in which industrial employment declined by more than 30% and service sector employment more than doubled. Using transition data on individual workers, we document a marked...

Different models of protection against labor market risks are associated with diverging models of economic performance. Historically established institutional complementarities between labor market regulation, unemployment protection, and vocational training tend to mirror specific national...

Does immigration accelerate sectoral change towards high-productivity sectors? This paper uses the mass displacement of ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe to West Germany after World War II as a natural experiment to study this question. A simple two-sector model of the economy, in which moving...