The impact of progressive era labor regulations on annual earnings and employment in manufacturing in the USA, 1904–1919

Samuel K. Allen (), Price V. Fishback and Rebecca Holmes
Additional contact information
Samuel K. Allen: VMI, Lexington, VA, USA
Price V. Fishback: University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA
Rebecca Holmes: Republic Services Inc, Phoenix, AZ, USA

Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History, 2025, vol. 19, issue 1, 249-278

Abstract: We analyze the impact of the broad range of state labor regulations on employment and annual earnings in manufacturing for wage earners and salaried workers using a new panel data set for the 48 US states in 1904, 1909, 1914, and 1919. The efects of state labor regulations infuenced the labor market for wage earners and had virtually no efect on the market for salaried workers. Fixed efects analysis shows that increases in a newly developed labor law index were associated with a rise in employment and a decline in earnings for wage workers. These changes imply a dominant rise in labor supply that refected marginal benefts for workers that were higher than the marginal costs or marginal benefts to employers. After the demand and supply shifts were completed, both workers and employers ultimately experienced improved gains from trade. Under a wide range of assumptions about the earnings elasticity of demand, the results are also consistent with the regulation increasing labor demand and thus providing positive marginal benefts to employers. The efects of appropriations per gainfully employed worker were much smaller and depended on the size of the law index.

Keywords: Labor; legislation; ·; Manufacturing; ·; Progressive; era (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N31 N32 N61 N62 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-024-00287-2 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to journal subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:afc:cliome:v:19:y:2025:i:1:p:249-278

Access Statistics for this article

Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History is currently edited by Claude Diebolt, Dora Costa and Jean-Luc Demeulemeester

More articles in Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History from Association Française de Cliométrie (AFC) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().