Extensive and Intensive Margins of Labour Supply: Work and Working Hours in the US,the UK and France*

This paper provides a new analysis of the main stylised facts underlying the evolution of labour supply at the extensive and intensive margins in three countries: the United States, the United Kingdom and France. We propose a definition of the extensive and intensive margins corresponding respectively to the employment rate and to hours when employed. This definition is robust to the choice of the reference period and we develop a new statistical decomposition that provides bounds on changes at these margins. We focus on longer-run labour supply changes over the period 1977 to 2007 and abstract from the shorter-run impact of recessions. Examining secular changes over this period, we show that both margins matter in explaining changes in total hours. We then provide a detailed analysis across countries and across time by demographic type. Given the large systematic differences we uncover in the importance of these margins by age and gender, it is unlikely that a single explanation will suffice to account for the macroeconomic evolutions in the three countries.     

Does market structure matter on banks’ profitability and stability? Emerging vs. advanced economies

We empirically investigate the effects of market structure on profitability and stability for 1929 banks in 40 emerging and advanced economies over 1999–2008 by incorporating the traditional structure-conduct-performance (SCP) and relative-market-power (RMP) hypotheses. We observe that a greater market share leads to higher bank profitability being biased toward the RMP hypothesis in advanced economies, yet neither of the hypotheses is supported for profitability in emerging economies. The SCP appears to exert a destabilising effect on advanced banks, suggesting that a more concentrated banking system may be vulnerable to financial instability, however, the RMP seems to perform a stabilising effect in both economies. Evidence also highlights that profitability and stability increase with an increased interest-margin revenues in a less competitive environment for emerging markets. Overall, these results suggest that although policy measures to promote competition may dampen economic rent, excessive implementation may have an undesired destabilising impact on banks.     

US cross-listing and corporate disclosure policy

We investigate whether cross-listing in the US contributes to impound more earnings information into stock prices. Our results indicate that US exchange cross-listings are not associated with more future earnings news reflected in current prices, in accord with the view that such mechanism does not improve the information environment of non-US firms. This main finding is robust to many aspects of our methodology.     

Value-at-risk capital requirement regulation,risk taking and asset allocation: a mean–variance analysis

In this study, the mean–variance framework is employed to analyze the impact of the Basel value-at-risk (VaR) market risk regulation on the institution's optimal investment policy, the stockholders’ welfare, as well as the tendency of the institution to change the risk profile of the held portfolio. It is shown that with the VaR regulation, the institution faces a new regulated capital market line, which induces resource allocation distortion in the economy. Surprisingly, only when a riskless asset is available does VaR regulation induce the institution to reduce risk. Otherwise, the regulation may induce higher risk, accompanied by asset allocation distortion. On the positive side, the regulation implies an upper bound on the risk the institution takes and it never induces the firm to select an inefficient portfolio. Moreover, when the riskless asset is available, tightening the regulation always increases the amount of maintained eligible capital and decreases risk.     

Innovations du travail et syndicats de la fonction publique: un partenariat À construire

Résumé ** :  Au cours des dix dernières années, les acteurs de l'administration publique du Québec ont expérimenté une configuration organisationnelle créative et originale constituée des Comités ministériels sur l'organisation du travail (CMOT). Peu d'études et de recherches se sont intéressées à cette forme de partenariat entre l'État, les syndicats et les associations professionnelles. Nous proposons une étude de cas de trois CMOT que nous considérons comme étant des innovations sociales dans l'administration publique. Les acteurs ont du mal à s'entendre sur les frontières délimitant la zone d'influence des CMOT au sein des ministères. Des nouvelles tensions naissent entre les gestionnaires et les représentants syndicaux. Néanmoins, une nouvelle zone de coopération se forme conduisant à un nouvel équilibre dans les relations entre les acteurs de l'administration publique. Nous proposons une analyse de la mise en place des CMOT, de sa lente évolution marquée de ruptures et de reprises. Malgré les obstacles, les acteurs s'entendent pour affirmer que le partenariat est nécessaire à la bonne marche du processus de transformation de l'administration publique .     

Contested Resources: Unions,Employers, and the Adoption of New Work Practices in US and UK Telecommunications

The pattern of adoption of high‐performance work practices has been explained in terms of strategic contingency and in terms of union presence. We compare the post‐deregulation/privatization changes in work practice at AT&T, Bell Atlantic and British Telecom. On the basis of these cases, we argue that the choice of new work practices should be understood as a consequence not only of the company's resources or changes in its environment, nor of a simple union presence, but also as a consequence of the practices' effects on union power, the nature of the union's engagement, and the union's strategic choices.     

Are Underground Workers More Likely to be Underground Consumers?

We investigate the impact of working in the underground sector on the demand for underground commodities. Using a tax evasion model with costly information, we show that the presence of a network effect encourages underground workers to purchase underground commodities. The model is estimated using a unique Canadian microdata set for 1993. An increase in underground hours of work has a strong positive effect on the probability of purchasing underground commodities and on the level of expenditures. This relationship has a sizable effect on the impact of tax and enforcement parameters on the level of the underground economy.     

Exploring the effect of a middle response category on response style in attitude measurement

In this research we focus on the link between response style behaviour in answering rating data such as Likert scales and the number of response categories that is offered. In a split-ballot experiment two versions of a questionnaire were randomly administered. The questionnaires only differed in the number of response categories, i.e. 5 vs. 6 categories. In both samples a latent-class confirmatory factor analysis revealed an extreme response style factor. The 6-response categories version, however, revealed the more consistent set of effects. As far as the content latent-class factors, i.e. familistic values and ethnocentrism, are concerned, results were fairly similar. However, a somewhat deviant pattern regarding the familistic values items in the 6-response categories version suggested that this set of items is less homogeneous than the set of ethnocentric items. The effect of gender, age and education was also tested and revealed similarities as well as differences between the two samples.