Comparing aggregate statistics and surveying selected empirical studies, this paper shows that the characteristics and results of labour markets in eastern and western Germany have become quite similar in some respects but still differ markedly in others even 25 years after unification. Whereas...

This paper analyzes the effect of skill heterogeneity on regional patterns of production and housing in the presence of pecuniary externalities within a general-equilibrium framework, assuming monopolistic competition in intermediate goods markets. It shows that the interplay of heterogeneous...

Combining a spatial equilibrium model with a search-matching unemployment model, this paper analyzes the willingness to pay for regional amenities and the regional quality of life when wages, rents, and unemployment risk compensate for local amenities and disamenities. The results are compared...

Combining a spatial equilibrium model with a matching unemployment model, this paper analyzes the regional quality of life when wages, rents, and unemployment risk compensate for local amenities and disamenities. In particular, the paper shows for quasi-linear utility that the effects of any...

Employing a standard matching unemployment model extended by within-labor-market-regions commuting, this paper analyzes the tradeoff between commuting costs and unemployment. Depending on whether commuters are able to bargain for fringe benefits, search may or may not be biased towards distant...

The wage curve identified by Blanchflower and Oswald (1994) postulates that the wage level is a decreasing function of the regional unemployment rate. In testing this hypothesis, most empirical studies have not taken into account that differences in the institutional framework may have an impact...

Building on the right-to-manage model of collective bargaining, this paper tries to infer union power from the observed results in wage setting. It derives a time-varying indicator of union strength and confronts it with annual data for Germany. The results show that union power was relatively...

Despite its lack of attractiveness to other countries, the German system of quasiparity codetermination at company level has held up remarkably well. We recount the theoretical arguments for and against codetermination and survey the empirical evidence on the effects of the institution, tracing...