In this paper we develop a theory of union bargaining power based on firm-specific skills acquired by the insider work-force. We show that unions increase the bargaining power of insiders only in states of the world in which the firm would like to retain insiders but not hire outsiders. Union...

The "political costs" hypothesis predicts that labour bargaining creates incentives to reduce accounting earnings in order to avoid salary demands. Previous studies in countries with a "close shop system", such as the U.S. and Canada, have obtained mixed results. We argue that the political...

In this paper, we develop a theory of union bargaining power based on firm specific skills acquired by the insider workforce. We show that unions increase the bargaining power of insiders only in states of the world in which the firm would like to retain insiders but not hire outsiders.

This paper studies the intertemporal problem of a monopolistic firm that engages in productivity enhancing innovations to reduce its labor costs. If the level of wages is sufficiently low, the firm's rate of productivity growth approaches the rate of wage growth and eventually the firm reaches a...

In this paper we develop a theory of union power based on the aggregation of bargaining power of individual workers with firm specific skills. Union power depends on the ease of replacement from internal and external labor markets. Unions increase the bargaining power of insiders only in states...

A basic feature of the industry wage model presented here is a distinction between unionized industries, with collective bargaining and thus a rigid setting framework, and non-unionized industries, where wage determination is more competitive.

France has experienced massive changes in its regulation of working time during the last decade. These changes generate natural experiments that may help to study a variety of issues in labor economics, including work sharing effect on job creation or productivity, labor relations or adaptation...

It would be hard, even today, to deny that labour unions are important economic institutions, and it is this importance that makes their consequences for efficiency so substantial. Interest in the economic analysis of unions was revived in the early 1980s, in large part by a paper by Ian...