The goal of this paper is to provide the elements of a unitary analytical framework that incorporates the findings of two bodies of literature which, so far, havedeveloped independently: comparative models of the political economy that distinguish between coordinated and uncoordinated market...

What determines the structure of labour market institutions? This paper argues that common explanations based on rent sharing are incomplete; unions, job protection, and egalitarian pay structures may have as much to do with social insurance of otherwise uninsurable risks as with rent sharing and...

The staff scheduling problem in the retail business is considered for which a new mathematical model and new solution methods are introduced. The problem is formalized as a set covering type problem. Columns represent feasible weekly working time patterns of one sales clerk. Rows correspond to...

We present a growth model in which R&D increases productivity, union-firm bargaining determines the distribution of rents and the government can support unions by labour market regulation. We show that if unions are initially very strong, regulation increases only the workers? profit share and...

Many European labor markets are characterized by heavy employment protection taxes and the widespread use of fixed-duration contracts. The simultaneous use of these two policy instruments seems somewhat contradictory since the former primarily aims at limiting job destruction whereas the latter...

The existing literature ignores the fact that in most European countries the strictness of Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) varies across the firm size distribution. In Italy firms are obliged to rehire an unfairly dismissed worker only if they employ more than 15 employees....