In this paper we test the convergence hypothesis among OECD economies from 1960 to 1990. The empirical growth literature has found in the OECD the best example of a homogenous group of countries in which the convergence proposition of the constant returns growth model is likely to hold. We...

This paper investigates the relationship between trade unions and financial performance using British establishment-level data in 1990, following the anti-union legislation of the 1980s. We estimate the overall impact of manual union recognition in 1990 to be roughly half what it was in 1984,...

Most managers enjoy considerable discretion and protection from possible interventions which enables them to look after their own interests. This is often attributed to the dispersion of shareholders and regulations that deter effective outside interventions. This paper presents a model that has...

This paper shows that search in the labor market has important effects on accumulation decisions. In a labor market characterized by search, employment contracts are naturally incomplete and this creates a wedge between the rates of return and marginal products of both human and physical...

The paper examines Hungary''s experience with banking and bankruptcy reform in the period 1992-94. The first part of the paper uses enterprise-level data to show that in 1992, the same year in which the amount of classified loans in the state-owned commercial banks grew enormously, the...

This paper reports the main findings from a survey of some 200 Polish firms carried out at the end of 1993. The central focus is on the relationship between different emerging forms of ownership and the extent and nature of enterprise level adjustments taking place. Four broad categories of...

This paper considers the effect of economic integration on the industrial structure and trade patterns of two countries which differ only in size. In a general equilibrium model of intra-industry trade, each country has two imperfectly competitive industries which can differ in three respects:...

We are attentive to labor practices in foreign lands but as the quotations above indicate, we are unsure about the lessons to be drawn from these practices. Will something that works `over there'' work here, or will it fail to `fit'' our ways of doing things? Which practices will adapt or evolve...

The literature on the dynamics of industry structure has generated very few robust empirical predictions. The paper shows that if one particular assumption is made about the pay off structure of an investment project, three well known games, a modified ''Grab the Dollar'' game, an auction and a...

In this paper I document changes in the distribution of employment in the UK labour market in the 1980s. I use two longitudinal data sources, an industry-level panel data set between 1979 and 1990 and the panel component of the 1984 and 1990 establishment-level Workplace Industrial Relations...