Although European institutions and national governments have long pushed for a more decentralized wage bargaining structure, in some countries company or establishment-level negotiations struggle to take place. This paper offers an interpretation for that based on workers' optimal choices in an...

Although European institutions and national governments have long pushed for a more decentralized wage bargaining structure, in some countries company or establishment-level negotiations struggle to take place. This paper offers an interpretation for that based on workers' optimal choices in an...

The micro- and macroeconomic effects of the declining power of trade unions have been hotly debated by economists and policymakers. Nevertheless, the empirical evidence shows that the impact of the decline on economic aggregates and firm performance is not an overwhelming cause for concern....

In a framework of a unionised oligopoly, this paper reconsiders the impact of the bargaining structure on union wages. In particular, two dimensions along which centralisation may occur, namely the professional and firm line, are integrated into one modelling framework. It will be shown that,...

The micro- and macroeconomic effects of the declining power of trade unions have been hotly debated by economists and policymakers. Nevertheless, the empirical evidence shows that the impact of the decline on economic aggregates and firm performance is not an overwhelming cause for concern....

This paper examines the behavior of dual jobholders to test a simple model of wage bargaining and wage posting. We estimate the sensitivity of wages and separation rates to wage shocks in a worker's secondary job to assess the degree of bargaining versus wage posting in the labor market. We...

Using several unique data sets on wage agreements at both industry and firm levels in France, we document stylized facts on wage stickiness and the impact of wage-setting institutions on wage rigidity. First, the average duration of wages is a little less than one year and around 10 percent of...

We consider and attempt to understand the gender wage gap across 24 EU member states, all of which share the objective of gender equality, using 2007 data from the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions. The size of the gender wage gap varies considerably across countries and...

The labour market in Russia is very flexible. Firms adjust to economic shocks through wage cuts, working hour reductions and minimisation of non-wage labour costs. Workers react by changing jobs. This results in a high and stable overall employment rate, but also high wage inequality,...