Monetary Regimes and the Co-Ordination of Wage Setting

International comparisons show that countries with co-ordinated wage setting generally have lower unemployment than countries with less co-ordinated wage setting. This paper argues that the monetary regime may affect whether co-ordination among many wage setters is feasible. A strict monetary regime, like a country-specific inflation target, to some extent disciplines wage setters, so that the consequences of uncoordinated wage setting are less detrimental than under a more passive monetary regime (eg a monetary union). Thus, the gains from co-ordination are larger under a passive regime. Under some circumstances a passive regime may induce co-operation in wage setting, and thus lower unemployment, when a stricter regime would not.Wage setting, co-ordination, equilibrium unemployment, monetary regime, monetary union, wage moderation

Wage Formation under Low Inflation

This paper reviews the literature on the effects of low steady-state inflation on wage formation, focusing on four different effects. First, under low inflation, downward nominal wage rigidity (DNWR) may prevent real wage cuts that would have happened had inflation been higher. Second, wages (and prices) are given in nominal contracts, and inflation affects both how often wages are adjusted, and to what extent wages are set in a forward-looking manner. Third, incomplete labour contracts may provide workers with scope for inflicting costs on the firm without violating the contract, thus forcing the firm to accept a rise in nominal wages. Fourth, if effort depends on wages relative to a reference level, and workers and firms underweight inflation when updating the reference level, positive but moderate inflation may reduce wage pressure. The paper ends by a brief survey of empirical evidence, and a discussion of whether labour markets may adapt to a low inflation environment.wage formation, nominal contracts, inflation

Behavioural Macroeconomics and the Aggregate Supply Puzzle

The paper provides a short and simplified overview of important deviations from the economic man assumption that have been documented in research by cognitive psychologists and experimental economists. After the overview, I proceed to look at one specific topic within macroeconomics – the short run aggregate supply schedule – and discuss whether theories based on behavioural assumptions might perhaps resolve weaknesses in the more traditional approach.behavioural macroeconomics, bounded rationality, aggregate supply

Wage Setting Under Different Monetary Regimes

In an economy with large wage setters (like industry unions), the monetary regime affects the trade-off between consumer real wages and employment and profits faced by the wage setters. This paper shows that an exchange rate target, including participation in a monetary union, is likely to involve lower wages in the traded sector, and higher wages in the non-traded sector, than does a price target. An exchange rate target also involves higher prices on non-traded goods relative to traded goods. Overall welfare is likely to be higher under a price target.wage bargaining, monetary union, inflation target, monetary regime, equilibrium unemployment

Do Choices Affect Preferences? Some Doubts and New Evidence

Recent research is exploring the case for choice-induced changes in preferences using the free-choice paradigm of Brehm (1956). Participants are faced with a choice between items that they have given the same rating of liking, two items at a time, and it is found that an item not chosen in one choice has a lower tendency of being chosen in a subsequent choice. This tendency is interpreted as evidence for choice-induced changes in preferences. I argue that this interpretation of the evidence is invalid. Furthermore, I report a novel experiment in which participants were specifically asked to compare the items, allowing for a consistent interpretation of the evidence. I find no evidence of choice-induced changes in preferences after a choice between items where one was viewed as more attractive than the other, but potentially some weak evidence of changes in preferences after a choice between items viewed as equally attractive.choice-induced changes in preferences, post-decision dissonance, cognitive dissonance, choice, carry-over effects

Wage formation under low inflation

This paper reviews the literature on the effects of low steady-state inflation on wage formation, focusing on four different effects. First, under low inflation, downward nominal wage rigidity (DNWR) may prevent real wage cuts that would have happened had inflation been higher. Second, wages (and prices) are given in nominal contracts, and inflation affects both how often wages are adjusted, and to what extent wages are set in a forward-looking manner. Third, incomplete labour contracts may provide workers with scope for inflicting costs on the firm without violating the contract, thus forcing the firm to accept a rise in nominal wages. Fourth, if effort depends on wages relative to a reference level, and workers and firms underweight inflation when updating the reference level, positive but moderate inflation may reduce wage pressure. The paper ends by a brief survey of empirical evidence, and a discussion of whether labour markets may adapt to a low inflation environment.wage formation, nominal contracts, downward nominal wage rigidity, inflation

Contract Adjustment under Uncertainty

Consider a contract over trade in continuous time between two players, according to which one player makes a payment to the other, in exchange for an exogenous service. At each point in time, either player may unilaterally require an adjustment of the contract payment, involving adjustment costs for both players. Players’ payoffs from trade under the contract, as well as from trade under an adjusted contract, are exogenous and stochastic. We consider players’ choice of whether and when to adjust the contract payment. It is argued that the optimal strategy for each player is to adjust the contract whenever the contract payment relative to the outcome of an adjustment passes a certain threshold, depending among other things of the adjustment costs. There is strategic substitutability in the choice of thresholds, so that if one player becomes more aggressive by choosing a threshold closer to unity, the other player becomes more passive. If players may invest in order to reduce the adjustment costs, there will be over-investment compared to the welfare maximizing levels.

Do Government Purchases Affect Unemployment?

We investigate empirically the effect of government purchases on unemployment in 20 OECD countries, for the period 1960-2007. Compared to earlier studies we use a data set with more variation in unemployment, and which allows for controlling for a host of factors that influence the effect of government purchases. We find that increased government purchases lead to lower unemployment; an increase equal to one percent of GDP reduces un-employment by 0.2 percentage point in the same year. The effect is greater in downturns than in booms, and also greater under a fixed exchange rate regime than under a floating regime.fiscal policy, unemployment

Discrimination and Employment Protection

We study a search model with employment protection legislation. We show that if the output from the match is uncertain ex ante, there may exist a discriminatory equilibrium where workers with the same productive characteristics are subject to different hiring standards. If a bad match takes place, discriminated workers will use longer time to find another job, prolonging the costly period for the firm. This makes it less profitable for the firms to hire the discriminated workers, thus sustaining discrimination. In contrast to standard models, the existence of employers with a taste for discrimination may make it more profitable to discriminate also for firms without discriminatory preferences.discrimination, employment protection, hiring standards

Downward Nominal Wage Rigidity in Europe

This paper explores the existence of downward nominal wage rigidity (DNWR) in the industry sectors of 14 European countries, over the period 1973–1999, using a data set of hourly nominal wages at industry level. Based on a novel nonparametric statistical method, which allows for country and year specific variation in both the median and the dispersion of industry wage changes, we reject the hypothesis of no DNWR. The fraction of wage cuts prevented due to DNWR has fallen over time, from 70 percent in the 1970s to 20 percent in the 1990s, but the number of industries affected by DNWR has increased. Wage cuts are less likely in countries and years with high inflation, low unemployment, high union density and strict employment protection legislation.Downward nominal wage rigidity, European countries, employment protection legislation