Unionization,market structure,and economic growth

This article investigates the macroeconomic effects of unionization in a Schumpeterian growth model with an endogenous product market structure and a unionized labor market. The endogeneity of the market structure and the trade unionism of the labor market interact and jointly determine the equilibrium unemployment, firm size, number of firms, economic growth, and distribution of income between workers and firms. We show that unionization governs the distribution of income between workers and firms and the unemployment rate, but it does not give rise to any growth effect on the economy. In addition, unionization discourages potential entrants and hence decreases the equilibrium number of firms. These results echo the empirical observation in the sense that unionization raises unemployment and alters the distribution of income between workers and firms, but it does not give rise to a significant, real impact on the firms’ investment and the economy‐wide growth.     

Trade with Asia and skill upgrading: Effects on labor markets in the older industrial countries

Trade with Asia and Skill Upgrading: Effects on Factor Markets in the Older Industrial Countries. — The trade and labor nexus is examined with a model incorporating refinements which weaken the H-O-S result that free trade can cause factor rewards to equalize. Asian growth and rising openness in the period 1970–1992, taken in isolation, are found to cause real wages to rise there, even for production workers. Although they also cause increased wage dispersion, the magnitude is small compared with the effects of skill upgrading. Projections to 2010, which combine further expansion in imports from Asia with continued Northern skill upgrading, yield declining real wages and/or unemployment for both production and farm workers. Restricting imports from Asia is found to be an ineffective response.     

Identifying government spending shocks and multipliers in Korea

We construct a government spending news series in Korea based on Fisher and Peters (2010) by exploiting a market-weighted sum of excess stock returns of military contractors in Korea. We then use this military spending news series and estimate a structural VAR model to evaluate the effects of government spending. As a result, GDP and government spending show statistically significant responses to military spending news shocks. The accumulated government spending multiplier peaks after four quarters, and the five-year cumulative multiplier is calculated as 1.27. For a robustness check, different types of VAR models are tested and results are qualitatively similar.     

Efficient regulated entry in competitive markets with demand uncertainty

It is well-known that, in a competitive market, the number of firms in a free-entry equilibrium is the efficient one. This paper shows that this textbook result breaks down if firms face demand uncertainty. In this case, entry is excessive relative to the optimum and, therefore, regulation improves market efficiency. This occurs because, in the absence of regulation, entry is motivated by the profits that firms expect to receive if market demand turns out to be high. However, when choosing the optimal regulated entry, the planner also considers that some surplus is lost if demand turns out to be low.     

Dynamics between government spending and economic growth in China: an analysis of productivity growth

This study investigates the dynamics between government spending and economic growth in China through influencing the productivity growth of human capital byapplying Markov switching estimates for the annual time series data of China over the period 1952–2014. Firstly, we found that the Chinese economy exists in two states including state one with low growth and state two with high growth. Secondly, the consumption spending has significantly positive effect both states, while the military spending has only positive effect in state two. Interestingly, the growth effect level of consumption spending in state two is smaller than that in state one, implying a reducing effect of total factor productivity in state two. Thirdly, the combined effects of consumption spending and military spending with human capital are state dependent. This combined effect is reduced in both states, suggesting that government spending does not improve the productivity growth effect of human capital.     

The price of human capital in a pre-industrial economy: Premiums and apprenticeship contracts in 18th century England

Training through apprenticeship provided the main mechanism for occupational human capital formation in pre-industrial England. This paper demonstrates how training premiums (fees) complemented the formal legal framework surrounding apprenticeship to secure training contracts. Premiums varied in response to scarcity rents, the expected productivity of masters and apprentices, and served as compensation for the anticipated risk of default. In most trades premiums were small enough to allow access to apprenticeship training for youths from modest families.     

China''s land arrangements and rural labor mobility

Chinese farm families under the Household Responsibility System have the land use-rights but not the rights of alienation. If permanently leaving agriculture, they have to return the land to local authorities and consequently give up a stream of future land earnings. This paper analyzes the deterrent effect of this land arrangement on labor mobility by constructing a household model which considers both part-time farming and permanent migration decisions. The implications of the model are consistent with the recent Chinese experience of rural floating population in cities and the rapid growth of rural nonagricultural employment.     

The rise of migration and the fall of self employment in rural China's labor market

When examining questions regarding the Lewis model, one of the most salient set of facts involves the shift of labor between agricultural and the off farm sectors. The goal of this paper is to answer several questions about the nature of this movement: How has the expansion of the economy after 2000 affected off farm labor market participation? Has off farm labor continued to rise? What is this rise being driven by—migrant wage earners or self employment opportunities? What is, in part, driving these trends? Using a national representative set of data that consists of two waves of surveys done in 2000 and 2008 in six provinces, the paper finds that off farm labor market participation has continued to rise steadily in the early 2000s. However, there has been a structural break in the trends of occupational choice before and after 2000. Unlike before 2000, after 2000 migration's growth accelerated; during this same period the self employed subsector stagnated. The number of wage earning migrants in 2008 was greater than the number of those in the self employed subsector. The data also show that the rise in wage-earning migration is mainly being driven by the younger cohorts. Our analysis also shows that the rise of migration is happening in conjunction with a rising unskilled wage.     

Optimal government investment and public debt in an economic growth model

This paper establishes a nonlinear theoretical model and uses panel smoothing transitional regression to study the optimal levels of government investment and public debt in a growth model using a panel dataset of 65 developed and developing economies over the period 1991–2014. The empirical results show that the effect of government investment on economic growth is decreasing as the level of expenditure rises. When the government investment/GDP ratio reaches a certain point (threshold), the effect of government investment could change from positive to negative. The effect of public debt on economic growth demonstrates a similar pattern. Our results suggest that there must exist an optimal level of government investment or public debt as far as economic growth is concerned, although the optimal level may vary in different economies. The government investment/GDP and public debt/GDP ratios of China were respectively 15.66% and 41.14% in 2014. These levels did not reach their respective thresholds and hence their effects on economic growth were still in the positive territory. Despite the expansion of government investment and public debt in China after the world financial crisis, their scales had not affected the country's economic growth during the data period.     

Product Scope and Productivity: Evidence from India's Product Reservation Policy

Protections for small enterprises are commonplace in developing countries. How do these policies affect overall industrial performance? Using exogenous variation in the timing of an Indian policy dismantling laws that “reserved” certain products for exclusive manufacture by small firms, we identify the effect of the dereservation policy on size, productivity, product churning, and other industry dynamics. Following the change, we find that firms significantly altered their product lines, leading to the reallocation of productive factors, increasing exits, and increasing total factor productivity. These effects were driven by new entrants moving into the formerly restricted product space, and in particular by multiproduct firms. Our findings underscore the importance of intrafirm heterogeneity on the impact of size‐contingent regulations, as firms' product line dynamics can be an important dimension of productivity growth.     

Output fluctuations with bargained wages and a competitive tradeable goods sector in the economy: Empirical estimates for the group of five, 1970.1 — 1985.4

Zusammenfassung Produktionsschwankungen bei ausgehandelten L?hnen und einem Wettbewerbssektor mit handelbaren Gütern. Empirische Befunde für die Fünfergruppe von Industriel?ndern für die Periode 1970–1985. — Der Verfasser untersucht die Beziehungen zwischen Lohnanpassung, Wettbewerbsf?higkeit, Fiskalpolitik und den Fluktuationen der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Produktion in den fünf wichtigsten Industrienationen vom ersten Quartal 1970 bis zum vierten Quartal 1985. Das von ihm benutzte Modell hat zwei besondere Merkmale: (i) unterschieden wird zwischen dem Sektor der handelbaren und dem der nicht handelbaren Güter; (ii) die L?hne sind das Ergebnis von Verhandlungen in dem Sektor, in dem Wettbewerb herrscht und in dem es handelbare Güter gibt. Als Ergebnis zeigen sich erhebliche Unterschiede zwischen den L?ndern — nicht nur bei den Gleichgewichtswerten, sondern auch bei den kurzfristigen Anpassungen.

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Resumen Fluctuaciones de la production en una economía con salarios negociados y un sector comercial competitivo: estimaciones empíricas para el Grupo de los Cinco 1970:I-1985:IV. — En este trabajo se investiga las relaciones entre ajuste salarial, competitividad, politica fiscal y fluctuaciones agregadas en las economías industriales más importantes durante el periodo 1970–1985. El modelo utilizado exhibe dos caracteristicas particulares: (a) la distinción entre bienes comerciados y bienes no comerciados y (b) negociaciones salariales que tienen lugar en el sector competitivo de bienes comerciados. Los resultados revelan diferencias substanciales entre los países, no sólo en sus relaciones de equilibrio, sino también en sus ajustes de corto plazo.

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Résumé Fluctuations de l’output dans une économie aux salaires négociés et au secteur compétitif des biens commerciaux: estimations empiriques pour le Groupe de Cinq, 1970:I à 1985:IV. — Dans cette étude l’auteur analyse les relations entre l’ajustement des salaires, la compétitivité, la politique fiscale et les fluctuations de production dans les économies industrialisées les plus importantes pendant la période 1970 à 1985. Le modèle a deux caractéristiques particuliers: (i) la distinction entre un secteur commercial et un secteur non-commercial, et (ii) la négociation des salaires qui a lieu au secteur compétitif des biens commerciaux. Les résultats rélèvent des différences substantielles entre les pays et pas seulement concernant les relations d’équilibre, mais aussi concernant leurs ajustements à court terme.

     

Effects of Patent Protection on Optimal Corporate Income and Consumption Taxes in an R&D‐Based Growth Model

Does reducing the corporate income tax accompanied by an increase in the consumption tax to meet the government's budget constraint improve welfare? To respond, we examine the welfare‐maximizing corporate income tax and consumption tax rates in an R&D‐based growth model under the constraint that the government's budget is balanced at each point of time. Further, we consider how welfare‐maximizing tax rates change as patent protection becomes stronger, as seen in many countries. The results show that as patent protection becomes stronger, the corporate income tax rate should be higher and the consumption tax rate should be lower. This implies that under stronger patent protection, recovering production at the expense of innovation by raising corporate income tax and reducing consumption tax improves welfare.     

Face Value: Information and Signaling in an Illegal Market

Economists argue that rich information environments and formal enforcement of contracts are necessary to prevent market failures when information asymmetries exist. We test for the necessity of formal enforcement to overcome the problems of asymmetric information by estimating the value of information in an illegal market with a particularly rich information structure: the online market for male sex work. We assemble a rich data set from the largest and most comprehensive online male sex worker Web site to estimate the effect of information on pricing. We show how clients of male sex workers informally police the market in a way that makes signaling credible. Using institutional knowledge, we identify the specific signal male sex workers use to communicate quality to clients: face pictures. We find that there is a substantial return to the signal in this market. The findings provide novel evidence on the ability of rich information environments to overcome problems of asymmetric information without formal enforcement mechanisms.     

Market integration and imperfect competition in labor and product markets

We analyze the consequences of product market integration in a simple two-country, two-sector, general-equilibrium model with imperfect competition due to economies of scale. In contrast to the existing literature we take explicit account of the labor-market structures in the integrating economies. It turns out that the specific labor-market structures are very important for how integration affects total production and product market structure in a particular economy. However, integration always gives rise to a welfare gain in both economies.I have benefitted from comments by an anonymous referee, a coeditor of this journal, and by participants in a workshop arranged by CIE in April 1992, at the University of Aarhus, and by participants at the EEA conference in Dublin 1992.     

Non-traded goods,firm dynamics and wages in a service economy

By considering the term-of-trade and volume-of-trade effects, Jones (2012) examines the distributive effect in a competitive economy with non-traded goods. This paper reexamines the effect in an imperfectively competitive economy with firm dynamics. A rise in foreign demand can generate revenue and also mitigate market distortion, whereas skilled-unskilled wage inequality can be magnified or mitigated via the effect on firm entry or exit. Thus, how to achieve the trade-off among growth, inequality and the environment becomes an important task for government decision-makers, especially so during the pandemic of Covid-19.     

Characteristics of labor market in Serbia - View on the labor demand on Belgrade and Banat labor markets

The labor market in Serbia is characterized by one of the highest unemployment rates of the working population （aged 15 to 64）. Also, it is notified that the unemployed level of the qualification is very low and that there isn＇t enough space in the existing formal educational system for any new introductions （such as prequalification courses, or lifelong educational concepts）. The research on the labor demand was aimed at assessing the state of the labor markets in the selected regions and at analyzing short-term demand for labor force. The analysis establishes： Which sectors of local/regional economy are being developed and are likely to require additional labor force in the next six months; which types of jobs are likely to be in demand in the aforementioned sectors; which additional knowledge and skills are needed for such occupations. The applied methodology also enabled to analyze information on vulnerable groups of unemployed, namely persons with disturbing factors in employment and the young unemployed of up to 24 years of age. In order to gather reliable data at regional level, a research was conducted on a stratified sample covering 1400 enterprises and some of the statistical labor market indicators were established indicating particularities of the labor markets in the surveyed regions -- Belgrade and Banat.     

Interest payments and the stability of the government budget deficit in an open and growing economy

Summary This article discusses the basic determinants of stability and instability of the accumulation of public debt in an open and growing economy. Unlike most previous studies which start from the basically short term IS-LM framework, this analysis centers on the long-term dynamics arising from the government budget restraint, the balance of payments restraint and the interaction between growth and income distribution. Several policy regimes for the government's budget are taken into consideration and specific attention is paid to the question of whether monetary and fiscal policy can effectively ensure the stability of the system.Comments by W. Driehuis, S.K. Kuipers and H. Thoben are gratefully acknowledged.     

Prostitutes,Pimps, and Brothels: Intermediaries,Information, and Market Structure in Prostitution Markets

Prostitution is a multi‐billion dollar, globally distributed, low‐concentration service industry that is receiving increasing attention in the economics literature. This article focuses on a widespread, but little studied, feature of this environment—the role of intermediaries (pimps or brothel owners) on market outcomes. Prostitution laws and markets are perhaps unique in that transactions between principals (prostitutes and johns) are legal in many countries, while intermediary activity (pimping) is illegal. After surveying the varying cross‐country legality of agents we develop a simple theoretical model to analyze how the presence or absence of intermediaries shifts the distribution of market surplus. We show that eliminating pimps and brothels may shift surplus in non‐obvious ways, depending on the precise function they perform and on whether equilibrium is pooling or separating across “high quality” and “low quality” market segments. The implications of alternative policy regimes (intermediaries legal or illegal) are considered.