We investigate empirically how sellers react to changes in the population of their consumers, identifying the effects of demand composition and demand size with limited information on costs. We show how pharmacists in Italy selectively increase the price of some products when they observe in...

Are product market and entry regulation key sources of low employment growth in many European countries? We investigate this question in the context of the French retail trade industry. Since 1974, approval by regional zoning boards has been required for the creation or extension of any large...

We study the impact of labour turnover on labour productivity using a panel dataset of 347 shops belonging to a large UK clothing retailer over1995-1999. For the within-shop link – holding constant the shop’s permanent characteristics – we observe an inverted U-shape effect of labour...

A large, mature and robust economic literature on pay for performance now exists, which provides a useful framework for thinking about pay for performance systems. I use the lessons of the literature to discuss how to design and implement pay for performance in practice.

We study effects of a firm's attempt to optimize an existing incentive scheme to increase sales growth for direct store delivery workers. Before optimization workers reported Ratchet Effects that lowered productivity. The altered incentive plan offered higher compensation for increased sales...

We use UK micro data to explore whether planning regulation reduced UK retailing productivity growth between 1997 and 2003. We document a shift to smaller shops, particularly within supermarket chains, following a regulatory change in 1996 which increased the costs of opening large stores. This...

This paper analyzes the effect of firing costs on aggregate productivity growth. For this purpose, a model of endogenous growth through selection and imitation is developed. It is consistent with recent evidence on firm dynamics and on the importance of reallocation for productivity growth. In...

It is now stylized that, while the impact of ownership on firm productivity is unclear, product market competition can be expected to have a positive impact on productivity, thereby making entry (or contestability of markets) desirable. Traditional research in the context of entry has explored...

We examine the effect of the minimum wage on restaurant prices. We contribute to both the study of economic impact of the minimum wage and to the micro patterns of price stickiness. For that purpose, we use a unique dataset of individual price quotes collected to calculate the Consumer Price...

This paper proposes a new mechanism linking trade and wage inequality in developing countries - the quality-upgrading mechanism - and investigates its empirical implications in panel data on Mexican manufacturing plants. In a model with heterogeneous plants and quality-differentiated goods, only...