Bargaining, binding contracts, and competitive wages

In a model where many workers bargain with one firm and sign binding contracts, we show existence of a stationary subgame perfect equilibrium. If the production function satisfies decreasing returns, each worker receives a share of his marginal product (treating all other workers as employed) in equilibrium. Thus, wages are competitive. This is in contrast to Stole and Zweibel (1996, Rev. Econ. Stud. 63, 375–410), who assume that contracts are non-binding and find that the payoff of a worker is a weighted average of the inframarginal contributions. Hence, binding contracts imply lower wages than non-binding contracts.     

Capital–Skill Complementarity and Inequality in Sweden

Income inequality increased in Sweden during the 1980s and 1990s, as did the returns to higher education. The main conclusion of this study is that increased income inequality between high‐ and low‐skilled workers is demand driven and is due to the presence of capital–skill complementarity in production. Increased investments in new, more efficient capital equipment, along with a slowdown in the growth rate of skilled labor, have raised the ratio of effective capital inputs per skilled worker, which, in turn, has increased the relative demand (and market return) for skilled labor through the capital–skill complementarity mechanism.     

Does pay affect productivity or react to it?: Examination of U.S. manufacturing

There may be a bi-directional relationship between wages and labor productivity. According to conventional theory, employers reward improvements in productivity by raising pay. It also has been argued that wage increases can provide an incentive to improve productivity. This study applies a technique by Geweke to identify the feedback between pay and productivity in U.S. manufacturing. For the 1949–1998 period, measures of directional feedback indicate that both “pay as reward” and “pay as incentive” behaviors have occurred, but the results vary across manufacturing subsectors.     

Gender pay differentials during the transition in Poland*

This paper assesses the relative economic welfare of women during the transition in Poland. After providing an account of gender differences in several labour market outcomes we analyse the male‐female wage differential over the period 1993–97. We find that there is almost no change in the wage gap, that most of the explained portion of the wage gap may be attributed to industrial and occupational segregation, and that a substantial portion of the wage gap remains unexplained. We briefly discuss possible socio‐economic explanations for our findings.     

强化激励 建立岗位绩效工资模式——浅谈深化地勘单位分配制度改革

工资分配制度改革是人事制度改革的重要组成部分,地勘单位的工资分配是一种高度集中的分配管理模式,执行的是国家政策规定的结构工资。在很大程度上存在平均主义,严重影响了职工工作积极性,制约了地勘经济的发展。地勘单位工资分配制度改革应强化工资分配的激励作用,坚持效率优先兼顾公平。实行岗位绩效工资,其构成应包括基本工资、物价补贴、年功工资、岗位工资、绩效工资等五项。同时要实行改革的配套措施,以激活内部分配。     

国有企业高层管理人员激励与企业绩效实证研究

在回顾国内高层管理人员激励与企业绩效实证研究的基础上，以2002年1月1日前在上海证券交易所上市只发行A股的344家国有和国有控股上市公司为样本，考虑不同的企业规模、所在地区、所属行业、资产负债率，先采用描述性方法考察了高层管理人员激励现状，然后利用线性回归模型检验了高层管理人员激励与企业绩效之间的关系，以期弄清楚对高层管理人员激励的有效性，并提出了国有企业高层管理人员薪酬激励建议。     

企业治理之合约安排视角研究

本文基于合约安排的视角对企业治理进行了研究．主要通过激励合约设计．分析代理人剩余分享系数、努力变量、激励变量、努力成本和激励成本等变量之间的相互关系及其经济意义，从而得出了一些主要的基本结论：第一，委托人设计的激励合约具有一定的状态依存性。第二，委托人的监管效率是合约设计的重要因素，且监管本身具有概率性。第三，委托人要关注边际业绩分享系数的作用，进而必须关注“剩余标的”本身的选择。第四，一旦委托人也对产出做出自己的贡献，代理人的风险中立性就不能保证带来最优的结果。第五，委托人“先行一步”的优势是激励合约效率最大化的重要因素。     

Testing the intertemporal labor supply model: are jobs important?

The neoclassical life-cycle labor supply model assumes that hours of work are determined by labor supply choices alone and does not include a role for employers or job distinctions. An alternative model in which employers have an interest in employee hours and changing jobs is costly may reconcile weak and conflicting evidence regarding the neoclassical model. An important implication of such an alternative is that individuals may face hours constraints on a job and thus can choose hours freely only between jobs. This paper tests several implications of the neoclassical model against this alternative model of hours determination. Using a unique panel of individuals and jobs constructed using data on women from the 1988–1992 Panel Study of Income Dynamics, I compare hours variances and labor supply elasticities measured within and between jobs. Results provide some evidence against the neoclassical model and suggest that ignoring the role of employers in determining hours of work can lead to downward bias in estimates of labor supply elasticities.     

A future for wages councils in the hospitality industry in the U.K.?

In 1974, in an effort to stimulate discussion on the role played by the Licensed Residential Establishment and Licensed Restaurant Wages Council, Mitchell and Ashton (1974) posed the following question; ‘Wages councils: do they matter?’ The article below attempts to provide a contemporary answer to this question and to widen the scope of the discussion to include the other wages councils which operate within the hospitality industry. The passage of a decade would appear to mark a suitable point at which to carry out such a review. Furthermore the timing is appropriate in that the imminent expiry of an International Labour Office convention has initiated a debate over the future status of the whole of the wages council system in Britain. Consequently it is interesting to consider how the hospitality industry stands in relation to this debate particularly in view of the recent attempts made by the Employment Minister to influence the latest award made by the L.R.W.C.     

Structural Changes in the Demand for Labor

This paper investigates why labor demand has shifted away from low-skilled toward high-skilled labor in The Netherlands. We focus on the role of changes in relative wages and technological progress. A flexible functional form, proposed by Diewert and Wales, the Symmetric Generalized McFadden cost function, is estimated for the exposed and sheltered sectors. The estimates are based on time-series data for the period 1972–1993, which recently became available. Labor-saving technological change explains most of the displacement of low-skilled workers. The computed elasticities suggest that substitution between labor as a whole and capital is small. However, substitution plays a modest role in the shift from low-skilled toward high-skilled labor, especially in the sheltered sector. Skill-capital complementarity seems relevant in both sectors.