Despite numerous similarities between the food retail sectors of France and the USA, there are significant contrasts in the jobs, and in particular the modal job, cashier. Notably, there are differences in pay, productivity and physical working position. Using the concept of...

We use a French firm-level data set containing 13,000 firms over the period 1994–2004 to analyze the relationship between credit constraints and firms’ R&D behavior over the business cycle. Our main results can be summarized as follows: (i) R&D investment is countercyclical without...

La spécificité des lois Aubry a été d'allier une réduction forte de la durée légale par voie législative et une incitation à la négociation de branche et d'entreprise en procédant en deux temps. Dès juin 1998 la première loi fixe une nouvelle norme de durée légale (au 1er janvier...

This paper investigates the impact of innovative workplace practices including job rotation and quality standards on occupational safety and mental strain. It uses a unique French dataset drawn from the 1998 Working Conditions survey, which provides information on individual workers for the year...

This article studies the consequences of a reduction of legal working time (RWT), using an union/employer bargaining model over the organization of work. A RWT can induce a higher flexibility of work, which is become bearable for reduced work time. This flexibility helps to finance a full wage...

This paper proposes a model in the spirit of Aghion and al. (2005) that relates the magnitude of the impact of competition on R&D to the cost of innovation. The effect of competition on R&D is an inverted U-shape. However, the shape is flatter and competition policy is therefore less relevant...

This paper exploits a unique panel of 59,000 French firms over 1990-2004 to investigate the interactions between R&D, advertising and the competitive environment.The empirical findings confirm the predictions of a dynamic model that complements results known in static frameworks. First, more...

We investigate the impact of new work practices and information and communication technologies (ICT) on working conditions in France. We use a unique French dataset providing information on individual workers for the year 1998. New work practices include the use of quality norms, job rotation,...

Both academic and political debates over the minimum wage generally focus on the minimum wage rate. However, the minimum wage is a complex institution composed of a wide variety of parameters. In this note, I show that nominal rates provide a very crude picture of minimal compensation and of...