Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Downward Wage Rigidities and Other Firms’ Responses to an Economic Slowdown: Evidence from a Survey of Colombian Firms

Contents:

Author Info

  • Ana María Iregui B.

    ()

  • Ligia Alba Melo B.

    ()

  • María Teresa Ramírez G.

    ()

Abstract

This paper uses a wage setting survey of 1,305 Colombian firms to explore the nature and sources of wage rigidities. This is the first study of a non-European emerging economy that uses evidence from a survey of firms to analyse this topic. The survey was carried out during the first half of 2009, when the Colombian economy was showing signs of a slowdown in economic activity and increasing unemployment. The sample is fully representative of the population under study. The results provide evidence of nominal and real downward wage rigidities in the country. The most important factor in not reducing base wages during an economic slowdown is to avoid the loss of more experienced and productive workers, which is related to the efficiency wage theory in its adverse selection version. In addition, ordered logit regressions were used to determine what factors are related to wage rigidities. The findings indicate that, in general, permanent contracts, workforce composition, labour intensity and the presence of collective agreements play an important role in explaining wage rigidities in the country.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.banrep.gov.co/docum/ftp/borra612.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by BANCO DE LA REPÚBLICA in its series BORRADORES DE ECONOMIA with number 007195.

as in new window
Length: 49
Date of creation: 05 Jul 2010
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:col:000094:007195

Contact details of provider:

Related research

Keywords:

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Jan Babecky & Philip Du Caju & Theodora Kosma & Martina Lawless & Julian Messina & Tairi Room, 2009. "Downward nominal and real wage rigidity : Survey evidence from European firms," Working Paper Research 182, National Bank of Belgium.
  2. Babecky, Jan & Caju, Philip Du & Kosma, Theodora & Lawless, Martina & Messina, Julian & Room, Tairi, 2009. "The margins of labor cost adjustment : survey evidence from European firms," Policy Research Working Paper Series 5160, The World Bank.
  3. Ana María Iregui & Ligia Alba Melo & María Teresa Ramírez, 2009. "Formación e incrementos de salarios en Colombia: Un estudio microeconómico a partir de una encuesta a nivel de firma," BORRADORES DE ECONOMIA 006286, BANCO DE LA REPÚBLICA.
  4. Ana María Iregui B. & Ligia Alba Melo B. & María Teresa Ramírez G., . "Are wages rigid in Colombia?: Empirical evidence based on a sample of wages at the firm level," Borradores de Economia 571i, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Gustavo Adolfo HERNANDEZ DIAZ, 2011. "Impuestos parafiscales y mercado laboral: Un análisis de Equilibrio General Computable," ARCHIVOS DE ECONOMÍA 008954, DEPARTAMENTO NACIONAL DE PLANEACIÓN.
  2. Ana María Iregui B. & Ligia Alba Melo B. & María Teresa Ramírez G., . "Wage Adjustment Practices and the Link between Price and Wages: Survey Evidence from Colombian Firms," Borradores de Economia 660, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
  3. Juan José Echavarría & Enrique López & Sergio Ocampo & Norberto Rodríguez, 2011. "Choques, instituciones laborales y desempleo en Colombia," BORRADORES DE ECONOMIA 009154, BANCO DE LA REPÚBLICA.
  4. Rodrigo Taborda & Juan Guataquí, 2011. "Manufacturing Employment and Wage Differentials After Structural Adjustment Reforms in Colombia: An Efficiency Wages Approach," Lecturas de Economía, Universidad de Antioquia, Departamento de Economía, issue 74, pages 87-117.
  5. Luis Eduardo Arango & Nataly Obando & Carlos Esteban Posada, 2011. "Los salarios reales a lo largo del ciclo económico en Colombia," BORRADORES DE ECONOMIA 008950, BANCO DE LA REPÚBLICA.
  6. Ana María iregui & Ligia Alba Melo B. & María Teresa Ramírez G., 2010. "Wage-setting Decisions on Newly Hired Employees:," BORRADORES DE ECONOMIA 007808, BANCO DE LA REPÚBLICA.
  7. Ana María Iregui & Ligia Alba Melo & María Teresa Ramírez, 2010. "Incrementos y rigideces de los salarios en Colombia: Un estudio a partir de una encuesta," REVISTA DE ECONOMÍA DEL ROSARIO, UNIVERSIDAD DEL ROSARIO.
  8. Gustavo Hernández, 2012. "Payroll Taxes and the Labor Market: A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis," Latin American Journal of Economics-formerly Cuadernos de Economía, Instituto de Economía. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile., vol. 49(1), pages 99-123, May.
  9. Ana María Iregui & Ligia Alba Melo B. & María Teresa Ramírez G., . "Wage-setting Decisions on Newly Hired Employees: Survey Evidence from Colombian Firms," Borradores de Economia 632, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:col:000094:007195

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Norma Judith Paternina).

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.