Empirical evidence suggests that the bargaining power of trade unions differs across firms and sectors. Standard models of unionization ignore this pattern by assuming a uniform bargaining strength. In this paper, we incorporate union heterogeneity into a Melitz (2003) type model. Union...

Trade unions are often argued to cause allocative inefficiencies and to lower welfare. We analyze whether this evaluation is also justified in a Cournot-oligopoly with free but costly entry. If input markets are competitive and output per firm declines with the number of firms (business...

This paper examines the decision-making process of students from an economic perspective in order to understand what determines an individual's willingness to provide effort. Our theoretical model predicts that ability and job market prospects are positive determinants. Analyzing a novel dataset...

How does a redistribution of trade gains affect welfare when income inequality matters? To answer this question, we extend the [1] model to unionized labor markets and heterogeneous workers. As redistribution schemes, we consider unemployment benefits that are financed either by a wage tax, a...

Empirical evidence suggests that high-productivity firms face stronger trade unions than low-productivity firms. Then a policy that puts all unions into a better bargaining position is no longer neutral for firm selection as in models with a uniform bargaining strength across firms. Using a...

Empirical evidence suggests that high-productivity firms face stronger trade unions than low-productivity firms. Then a policy that puts all unions into a better bargaining position is no longer neutral for firm selection as in models with a uniform bargaining strength across firms. Using a...

In a Cournot-oligopoly with free but costly entry and business stealing, output per firm is too low and the number of competitors excessive, assuming labor productivity to depend on the number of employees only or to be constant. However, a firm can raise the productivity of its workforce by...

How does cost uncertainty affect the welfare consequences of an oligopoly? To answer this question, we investigate a Cournot oligopoly in which firms produce a homogeneous commodity and market entry is feasible. Marginal costs are unknown ex-ante, i.e. prior to entering the market. They become...

If input markets are competitive and output per firm declines with the number of firms (business stealing effect), there will be excessive entry into a Cournot oligopoly for a homogeneous commodity. However, input markets are often imperfectly competitive and the price of labor is determined by...

How does an increase in organization costs (i.e. costs which arise when labor unions organize firm's workforces) affect the industry struc-ture, wage inequality and welfare? In the present paper, we build a model with costly and endogenous unionization, heterogeneous firms as well as free market...