Did Workers Pay for the Passage of Workers' Compensation Laws?

Price Fishback and Shawn Kantor

No 4947, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Market responses to legislative reforms often mitigate the expected gains that reformers promise in legislation. Contemporaries hailed workers' compensation as a boon to workers because it raised the amount of post-accident compensation paid to injured workers. Despite the large gains to workers, employers often supported the legislation. Analysis of several wage samples from the early 1900s shows that employers were able to pass a significant part of the added costs of higher post-accident compensation onto some workers in the form of reductions in wages. The size of the wage offsets, however, were smaller for union workers.

JEL-codes: J31 N32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1994-12
Note: DAE LS
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published as Quarterly Journal of Economics, 110 (August 1995) pp 713-742.

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Journal Article: Did Workers Pay for the Passage of Workers' Compensation Laws? (1995)
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