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The Consequences of Minimum Wage Laws: Some New Theoretical Ideas

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Author Info
James B. Rebitzer
Lowell J. Taylor

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Abstract

Economists generally agree that the immediate and direct effect of a binding minimum wage law is to move firms backward along the demand curve for low skill workers. However, this prediction of worker displacement depends critically on a model of firm behavior that abstracts from problems of work incentives. In this paper we re-examine the theoretical basis for the consensus view of minimum wage laws. The central finding is that when firms use the threat of dismissal to elicit high levels of work effort, an increase in the minimum wage may have the immediate and direct effect of increasing the level of employment in low wage jobs. The formal logic of our model is similar to that found in the model of labor demand under monopsony. However, unlike the monopsony model, the positive employment effect of the minimum wage emerges in a labor market comprised of a large number of firms competing for the labor services of identical workers.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 3877.

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Date of creation: Oct 1991
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:3877

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  1. Oliver E. Williamson, 1967. "Hierarchical Control and Optimum Firm Size," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75, pages 123. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Brown, Charles & Gilroy, Curtis & Kohen, Andrew, 1982. "The Effect of the Minimum Wage on Employment and Unemployment," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 20(2), pages 487-528, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Harry J. Holzer & Lawrence F. Katz & Alan B. Krueger, 1988. "Job Queues and Wages: New Evidence on the Minimum Wage and Inter-Industry Wage Structure," NBER Working Papers 2561, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Calvo, Guillermo A & Wellisz, Stanislaw, 1978. "Supervision, Loss of Control, and the Optimum Size of the Firm," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(5), pages 943-52, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Gibbons, Robert, 1987. "Piece-Rate Incentive Schemes," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 5(4), pages 413-29, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Alida Castillo Freeman & Richard B. Freeman, 1991. "Minimum Wages in Puerto Rico: Textbook Case of a Wage Floor?," NBER Working Papers 3759, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Dickens, William T, et al, 1989. "Employee Crime and the Monitoring Puzzle," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 7(3), pages 331-47, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Levine, David I., 1992. "Piece rates, output restriction, and conformism," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 473-489, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Akerlof, George A & Katz, Lawrence F, 1989. "Workers' Trust Funds and the Logic of Wage Profiles," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 104(3), pages 525-36, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Lang, Kevin, 1988. "Job Signalling and Welfare Improving Minimum Wage Laws: Reply," Economic Inquiry, Oxford University Press, vol. 26(3), pages 533-36, July.
  11. MacLeod, W. Bentley & Malcomson, James M., 1993. "Wage premiums and profit maximization in efficiency wage models," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 1223-1249, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  12. Carmichael, H Lorne, 1989. "Self-Enforcing Contracts, Shirking, and Life Cycle Incentives," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 65-83, Fall. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Shapiro, Carl & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1984. "Equilibrium Unemployment as a Worker Discipline Device," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 433-44, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Rebitzer, James B & Robinson, Michael D, 1991. "Employer Size and Dual Labor Markets," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(4), pages 710-15, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  15. Oi, Walter Y, 1983. "Heterogeneous Firms and the Organization of Production," Economic Inquiry, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(2), pages 147-71, April.
  16. Jeremy I. Bulow & Lawrence H. Summers, 1986. "A Theory of Dual Labor Markets with Application to Industrial Policy, Discrimination and Keynesian Unemployment," NBER Working Papers 1666, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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