Wages, Creative Destruction, and Union Networks

Harald Dale-Olsen (harald.dale-olsen@socialresearch.no)
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Harald Dale-Olsen: Institute for Social Research, Oslo

No 11894, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Do unions promote creative destruction? In this paper we apply a shift-share approach and historical unionisation data from 1918 to study the impact of changes in regional unionisation on regional wage and productivity growth and job creation and destruction during the period 2003-2012. As local regional-industrial unionisation increases, wages grow. Lay-offs through plant closure and shrinking workplaces increase, but entry and new hires are unaffected. Overall, the increased unionisation yields a positive impact on regional productivity, exceeding the wage growth, partly due to the closure of less productive firms, but also enhanced productivity of the survivors and new entrants.

Keywords: trade unions; entry/exit; creative destruction; wages; productivity; historical data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J01 J08 J50 J51 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35 pages
Date: 2018-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ent, nep-his, nep-lab and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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