Rent-Sharing And Wages: Product Demand Or Technology Driven Premia? 1

There is a renewed interest in non-competitive wage determination. Studies have shown that firms share rents with workers. How such rents are appropriated by firms to share, or why firms may wish to do so, is still an area of debate. Using a unique data set, where workers are matched directly to their workplace, we use instrumental variable estimation to examine which shocks create rent-sharing and the size of the rent-sharing effects. The results find rentsharing is strongest for establishments investing in new process technology, and for employers who wish to share their successes with their employees.