In this paper I investigate to what extent firm-specific uncertainty affects the gain from indexation. Earlier studies have tried to explain wage rigidity by arguing that insiders face little layoff risk due to employment fluctuations caused by aggregate shocks. However, this analysis abstracts from idiosyncratic risk and this seems hard to reconcile with recent microeconomic evidence which shows that firm-specific uncertainty explains a large part of establishments' employment changes. By numerically solving an insider-outsider model I show that the introduction of firm-specific uncertainty increases the gain from indexation considerably (from 0 to 1.5 percent of the wage). It is not evident that the gain from indexation is small enough to support an equilibrium with a constant nominal wage. According to the model, nominal wage contracts should be more prevalent, when layoff is not so costly for the worker, due to high unemployment benefits or short duration of unemployment spells.
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Paper provided by Uppsala University, Department of Economics in its series Working Paper Series with number
2000:11.
Length: 46 pages Date of creation: 06 Sep 2000 Date of revision: Publication status: Published in Scandinavian Journal of Economics, 2003, pages 247-254. Handle: RePEc:hhs:uunewp:2000_011
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Find related papers by JEL classification: E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomics: Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution J41 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Labor Contracts J63 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies - - - Turnover; Vacancies; Layoffs
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.:
Steven J. Davis & John C. Haltiwanger & Scott Schuh, 1998.
"Job Creation and Destruction,"
MIT Press Books,
The MIT Press,
edition 1, volume 1, number 0262540932, December.