This study provides empirical evidence for the economic rationality of wage rigidities. Theoretically wage rigidities can result from contracts, implicit contracts, from efficiency wages and from insider-outsider behaviour. Based on a survey of 801 firms strong support has been found for...

Using a large linked employer-employee data set, this paper studies the extent to which employers insure workers against transitory and permanent firm-level shocks. Particular emphasis is given to the question of whether the amount of wage insurance depends on the nature of industrial relations....

Vor dem Hintergrund der Diskussion um die Determinanten nicht-markträumender Löhne wird in dieser Arbeit der Einfluss der Tarifbindung, der Teilung von Firmenrenten und der Anwendung von Konzessionsverträgen (Beschäftigungssicherungsabkommen, Arbeitnehmer-Erfolgsbeteiligungen) auf die...

Industry-level time series data suggest that low-skilled workers get less insurance within the firm than high-skilled workers. In particular, wages respond relatively more to productivity shocks in low-skilled industries than high-skilled industries. Our theory is that low-skilled workers get...

This paper analyzes whether workplace employee representation (ER) affects the design of firm hierarchies. We rationalize the role of ER within a knowledge-based model of hierarchies, where the firm's choice of hierarchical layers depends on the trade-off between communication and knowledge...