In oligopolistic industries, increased cost saving opportunities via offshoring have a moderating effect on trade unions. In order to discourage mobile firms from leaving the country, unions accept lower sector wages. In effect, the negotiated wage becomes independent of workers' bargaining...

We analyze union behavior in a model with membership dynamics and compare the labor market outcomes to static union models. Based on empirical findings we modify standard models and show that the well-known result that static models overstate distortions caused by unions only holds in the...

Unions are often stigmatized as being a source of inefficiency due to higher collective bargaining outcomes. This is in stark contrast with the descriptive evidence presented in this paper. Larger firms choose to export and are also more likely to adopt collective bargaining. We rationalize...

Worker movements played a crucial role in making workplaces safer. Workplace safety is costly for firms but increases labour supply. A laissez-faire approach leaving safety of workplaces unknown is suboptimal. Safety standards set by better-informed trade unions are output and welfare...

Using employee-employer matched data for the period 1999 to 2010, I analyze the impact of a low-wage trade shock on manufacturing workers in a high-wage country, Denmark, and how they adjust to the shock over a decade. To derive causal effects I exploit the dismantling of import quotas on...

The issue of low-wage competition in services trade involving posted workers is controversial in the EU. Using Swedish survey data, people's attitudes are found to be more negative to such trade than to goods trade. The differences depend on both a preference for favouring social groups to which...

This paper sets up a general oligopolistic equilibrium model with two countries that differ in the centralization of union wage setting. Being interested in the consequences of openness, we show that, in the short-run, trade increases welfare and employment in both locations, and it raises...

In oligopolistic industries, increased cost saving opportunities via offshoring have a moderating effect on trade unions. In order to discourage mobile firms from leaving the country, unions accept lower sector wages. In effect, the negotiated wage becomes independent of workers’ bargaining...

Over the previous two decades, many OECD countries have lowered the degree of progressivity in their tax structures. In this paper, I investigate labour tax progression in a world characterised by a segmented labour market where the higher-paying jobs are rationed due to (i) oligopolistic market...