The answer to the question in the title of course depends on how we define economic performance. In an overlapping generations model we show that trade unions do worsen economic performance in the sense that we get uemployment, but it is quite likely that trade unions give rise to a higher...

This paper examines how unionization affects economic growth through its impact on industry concentration in a two-country model of international trade and endogenous productivity growth. Knowledge spillovers link firm-level productivity in innovation with geographic patterns of industry...