We provide strong new evidence that industry financial conditions play an important role in wage determination in the U.S. manufacturing sector. Ordinary least squares estimates of the effect of rents per worker on wages are positive and significant, but quite small. However, using two standard...

We provide new evidence that industry financial conditions help determine wages in the US manufacturing sector. Ordinary least squares estimates of the effect of rents per worker on wages are significantly positive, but quite small. We show that this may stem from econometric difficulties that...

Legally mandated reductions in the workweek can be either a constraint on individuals'' choice or a tool to coordinate individuals'' preferences for lower work hours. We confront these two hypotheses by studying the consequences of the workweek reduction in France from 39 to 35 hours, which was...

Regional labor market discrepancies have been widening in Belgium in the last two decades and are more evident within particular demographic groups. These developments can largely be accounted for by worse matching of people to jobs in the high-unemployment provinces. Using a structural VAR, it...

The recent crisis has had differential effects across U.S. states and industries causing a wide geographic dispersion in skill mismatches and housing market performance. We document these facts and, using data from the 50 states plus D.C from 1991 to 2008, we present econometric evidence that...

Using household level data for France from 1990 to 2000, we estimate a relationship between wages and unemployment taking into account compositional, time and regional effects. We show that this relationship shifted outward during the 1990s most likely because of a structural change in workers''...

Using panel data for 15 industrial countries, active labor market policies (ALMPs) are shown to have raised employment rates in the business sector in the 1990s, after controlling for many institutions, country-specific effects, and economic variables. Among such policies, direct subsidies to...

Slow productivity growth has plagued the euro area since the mid-1990s. That is particularly striking in view of the large productivity gains in the United States during the same period. This paper shows that the deceleration in labor productivity in the euro area was caused by structural...