Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Increased Price Markup from Union Coordination. OECD Panel Evidence

Contents:

Author Info

  • Roger Bjørnstad
  • Kjartan Øren Kalstad

    () (Statistics Norway)

Abstract

Existing literature have focused on the influence of institutional factors on wage determination when explaining the prolonged cross-country differences in unemployment. Although coordination of wage bargaining probably affects entry barriers and competition in product markets as well, research on price determination has typically not considered such factors. In this paper, an imperfect competition model - where the price markup depends on coordination of wage bargaining (and relative prices) - is set up and estimated on a panel of 15 OECD-countries. We derive a hypothesis that coordination has two separate effects on prices, i.e. an indirect effect through its effect on wages and a direct effect on the price markup. The estimates show that when we correct for the effect of coordination on wages, consumer prices may be as much as 21 percent higher in countries like Italy, the Netherlands, Ireland, Austria and Norway as compared to Canada, the US and the UK, due to the effect of coordination on the price markup. Since coordination probably has a dampening effect on wages, this may explain why many researchers have been unable to find any clear effect of coordination on unemployment in reduced form analysis.

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.ssb.no/publikasjoner/DP/pdf/dp470.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Research Department of Statistics Norway in its series Discussion Papers with number 470.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: Sep 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:ssb:dispap:470

Contact details of provider:
Postal: P.O.Box 8131 Dep, N-0033 Oslo, Norway
Phone: (+47) 21 09 00 00
Fax: (+47) 21 09 49 73
Email:
Web page: http://www.ssb.no/en/
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: Imperfect competition model; price markup; labor market institutions; unemployment; panel data model.;

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. Yu-Fu Chen & Dennis Snower & Gylfi Zoega, 2003. "Labour-market Institutions and Macroeconomic Shocks," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 17(2), pages 247-270, 06.
  2. Price, Simon & Dimitrios Asteriou & Peter Lukacs & Nigel Pain, 2003. "Manufacturing price determination in OECD countries; markups, demand and uncertainty in a dynamic heterogeneous panel," Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 168, Royal Economic Society.
  3. Richardson, J. David, 1978. "Some empirical evidence on commodity arbitrage and the law of one price," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 341-351, May.
  4. Giovannini, Alberto, 1988. "Exchange rates and traded goods prices," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1-2), pages 45-68, February.
  5. Stephen Nickell & Luca Nunziata & Wolfgang Ochel & Glenda Quintini, 2001. "The Beveridge Curve, Unemployment and Wages in the OECD from the 1960s to the 1990s - Preliminary Version," CEP Discussion Papers dp0502, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
  6. Choi, In, 2001. "Unit root tests for panel data," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 249-272, April.
  7. Luca Nunziata, 2005. "Institutions and Wage Determination: a Multi-country Approach," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 67(4), pages 435-466, 08.
  8. Olivier Blanchard & Justin Wolfers, 1999. "The Role of Shocks and Institutions in the Rise of European Unemployment: The Aggregate Evidence," NBER Working Papers 7282, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  9. Banerjee, A. & Marcellino, M. & Osbat, C., 2000. "Some Cautions on the Use of Panel Methods for Integrated Series of Macro-economic Data," Economics Working Papers eco2000/20, European University Institute.
  10. Martin, Christopher, 1997. "Price Information in an Open Economy: Theory and Evidence for the United Kingdom, 1951-1991," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(444), pages 1391-1404, September.
  11. Layard, Richard & Nickell, Stephen & Jackman, Richard, 1991. "Unemployment: Macroeconomic Performance and the Labour Market," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198284345, September.
  12. Taylor, Mark P & Peel, David A & Sarno, Lucio, 2001. "Nonlinear Mean-Reversion in Real Exchange Rates: Toward a Solution to the Purchasing Power Parity Puzzles," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1015-42, November.
  13. Stephen Nickell & Luca Nunziata & Wolfgang Ochel, 2005. "Unemployment in the OECD Since the 1960s. What Do We Know?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(500), pages 1-27, 01.
  14. Pål Boug, Ådne Cappelen and Anders Rygh Swensen, 2006. "The New Keynesian Phillips Curve for a Small Open Economy," Discussion Papers 460, Research Department of Statistics Norway.
  15. Pesaran, M. Hashem & Smith, Ron, 1995. "Estimating long-run relationships from dynamic heterogeneous panels," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 79-113, July.
  16. Francesco Daveri & Guido Tabellini, 2000. "Unemployment, growth and taxation in industrial countries," Economic Policy, CEPR & CES & MSH, vol. 15(30), pages 47-104, 04.
  17. Belot, M.V.K. & Ours, J.C. van, 2000. "Does the Recent Success of some OECD Countries in Lowering their Unemployment Rates lie in the Clever Design of their Labour Market Reforms?," Discussion Paper 2000-40, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
  18. Froot, Kenneth A & Klemperer, Paul D, 1989. "Exchange Rate Pass-Through When Market Share Matters," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(4), pages 637-54, September.
  19. Dixon, Huw David & Rankin, Neil, 1992. "Imperfect Competition and Macroeconomics: A Survey," CEPR Discussion Papers 636, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  20. Nickell, Stephen J, 1981. "Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(6), pages 1417-26, November.
  21. Andrew Glyn, 2003. "Labor Market Institutions and Unemployment: A Critical Assessment of the Cross-Country Evidence," Economics Series Working Papers 168, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
  22. Stephen Nickell, 1997. "Unemployment and Labor Market Rigidities: Europe versus North America," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 11(3), pages 55-74, Summer.
  23. Nunziata, Luca & Bowdler, Christopher, 2005. "Inflation Adjustment and Labour Market Structures: Evidence from a Multi-Country Study," IZA Discussion Papers 1510, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  24. Bruce, Neil & Purvis, Douglas D., 1985. "The specification and influence of goods and factor markets in open-economy macroeconomic models," Handbook of International Economics, in: R. W. Jones & P. B. Kenen (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 16, pages 807-857 Elsevier.
  25. Sen, Anindya & Dutt, Amitava Krishna, 1995. "Wage bargaining, imperfect competition and the markup: Optimizing microfoundations," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 15-20, April.
  26. Blanchard, Olivier Jean & Kiyotaki, Nobuhiro, 1987. "Monopolistic Competition and the Effects of Aggregate Demand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(4), pages 647-66, September.
  27. Michael P. Clements & Marianne Sensier, 2003. "Asymmetric output-gap effects in Phillips Curve and mark-up pricing models: Evidence for the US and the UK," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 50(4), pages 359-374, 09.
  28. Gordon, Robert J, 1981. "Output Fluctuations and Gradual Price Adjustment," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 19(2), pages 493-530, June.
  29. Dornbusch, Rudiger, 1987. "Exchange Rates and Prices," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(1), pages 93-106, March.
  30. Frenkel, Jacob A., 1978. "Purchasing power parity : Doctrinal perspective and evidence from the 1920s," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 169-191, May.
  31. Ashworth, Paul & Byrne, Joseph P., 2003. "Some international evidence on price determination: a non-stationary panel approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 809-838, July.
  32. Im, Kyung So & Pesaran, M. Hashem & Shin, Yongcheol, 2003. "Testing for unit roots in heterogeneous panels," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 115(1), pages 53-74, July.
  33. Judson, Ruth A. & Owen, Ann L., 1999. "Estimating dynamic panel data models: a guide for macroeconomists," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 9-15, October.
  34. Pedroni, Peter, 1999. " Critical Values for Cointegration Tests in Heterogeneous Panels with Multiple Regressors," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 61(0), pages 653-70, Special I.
  35. Peter Pedroni, 1999. "Critical Values for Cointegration Tests in Heterogeneous Panels with Multiple Regressors," Department of Economics Working Papers 2000-02, Department of Economics, Williams College.
  36. Levin, Andrew & Lin, Chien-Fu & James Chu, Chia-Shang, 2002. "Unit root tests in panel data: asymptotic and finite-sample properties," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1), pages 1-24, May.
  37. Isard, Peter, 1977. "How Far Can We Push the "Law of One Price"?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 67(5), pages 942-48, December.
  38. McKinnon, Ronald I., 1979. "Money in International Exchange: The Convertible Currency System," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195024098, September.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

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:ssb:dispap:470

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

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.