IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/somere/v48y2019i3p561-587.html

Power Law Distributions and the Size Distribution of Strikes

Author

Listed:
  • Michele Campolieti

Abstract

Using Canadian data from 1976 to 2014, I study the size distribution of strikes with three alternative measures of strike size: the number of workers on strike, strike duration in calendar days, and the number of person calendar days lost to a strike. I use a maximum likelihood framework that provides a way to estimate distributions, evaluate model fit, and also test against alternative distributions. I consider a few theories that can create power law distributions in strike size, such as the joint costs model that posits strike size is inversely proportional to dispute costs. I find that the power law distribution fits the data for the number of lost person calendar days relatively well and is also more appropriate than the lognormal distribution. I also discuss the implications of my findings from a methodological, research, and policy perspective.

Suggested Citation

  • Michele Campolieti, 2019. "Power Law Distributions and the Size Distribution of Strikes," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 48(3), pages 561-587, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:somere:v:48:y:2019:i:3:p:561-587
    DOI: 10.1177/0049124117729709
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0049124117729709
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0049124117729709?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:cup:cbooks:9780511771576 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Currie, Janet & McConnell, Sheena, 1991. "Collective Bargaining in the Public Sector: The Effect of Legal Structure on Dispute Costs and Wages," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(4), pages 693-718, September.
    3. Michele Campolieti & Robert Hebdon & Benjamin Dachis, 2014. "The Impact of Collective Bargaining Legislation on Strike Activity and Wage Settlements," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(3), pages 394-429, July.
    4. Vuong, Quang H, 1989. "Likelihood Ratio Tests for Model Selection and Non-nested Hypotheses," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 307-333, March.
    5. Robert P. Freckleton & William J. Sutherland, 2001. "Do power laws imply self-regulation?," Nature, Nature, vol. 413(6854), pages 382-382, September.
    6. Easley,David & Kleinberg,Jon, 2010. "Networks, Crowds, and Markets," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521195331, Enero-Abr.
    7. John Godard, 2011. "What Has Happened to Strikes?," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 49(2), pages 282-305, June.
    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


    Cited by:

    1. Michele Campolieti, 2021. "Strikes in British Coal Mining, 1893–1940: Testing Models of Strikes," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 243-273, April.
    2. Campolieti, Michele & Ramos, Arturo, 2021. "The distribution of strike size: Empirical evidence from Europe and North America in the 19th and 20th centuries," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 563(C).
    3. Michele Campolieti, 2023. "An event study analysis of the effects of collective bargaining legislation on strike outcomes," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 37(2), pages 242-279, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Michele Campolieti, 2023. "An event study analysis of the effects of collective bargaining legislation on strike outcomes," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 37(2), pages 242-279, June.
    2. Michele Campolieti & Chris Riddell, 2020. "Does Mediation-Arbitration Reduce Arbitration Rates? Evidence from a Natural Experiment," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 73(1), pages 211-235, January.
    3. Michele Campolieti & Robert Hebdon & Benjamin Dachis, 2016. "Collective Bargaining in the Canadian Public Sector, 1978–2008: The Consequences of Restraint and Structural Change," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 54(1), pages 192-213, March.
    4. Campolieti, Michele, 2015. "State dependence in the incidence of strikes: Evidence from Canadian contract data using Heckman’s dynamic probit model," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 7-9.
    5. Fabrice Gilles & Sabina Issehnane & Florent Sari, 2022. "Using short-term jobs as a way to find a regular job. What kind of role for local context?," TEPP Working Paper 2022-07, TEPP.
    6. Blazquez-Soriano, Amparo & Ramos-Sandoval, Rosmery, 2022. "Information transfer as a tool to improve the resilience of farmers against the effects of climate change: The case of the Peruvian National Agrarian Innovation System," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    7. Vipin Arora & Shuping Shi, 2016. "Nonlinearities and tests of asset price bubbles," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 50(4), pages 1421-1433, June.
    8. Luiz Paulo Fávero & Joseph F. Hair & Rafael de Freitas Souza & Matheus Albergaria & Talles V. Brugni, 2021. "Zero-Inflated Generalized Linear Mixed Models: A Better Way to Understand Data Relationships," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(10), pages 1-28, May.
    9. Da Fonseca José & Grasselli Martino & Ielpo Florian, 2014. "Estimating the Wishart Affine Stochastic Correlation Model using the empirical characteristic function," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 18(3), pages 253-289, May.
    10. Das, Marcel & van Soest, Arthur, 1999. "A panel data model for subjective information on household income growth," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 409-426, December.
    11. Gillespie, Colin S., 2015. "Fitting Heavy Tailed Distributions: The poweRlaw Package," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 64(i02).
    12. Luis Garicano & Thomas N. Hubbard, 2016. "The Returns to Knowledge Hierarchies," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 32(4), pages 653-684.
    13. Yen, Steven T. & Chern, Wen S. & Lee, Hwang-Jaw, "undated". "Effects Of Income Sources On Household Food Expenditures," 1991 Annual Meeting, August 4-7, Manhattan, Kansas 271167, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    14. Bel, K. & Paap, R., 2013. "Modeling the impact of forecast-based regime switches on macroeconomic time series," Econometric Institute Research Papers EI 2013-25, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Erasmus School of Economics (ESE), Econometric Institute.
    15. Seok, Sang Ik & Cho, Hoon & Ryu, Doojin, 2020. "The information content of funds from operations and net income in real estate investment trusts," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    16. Downward, Paul & Rasciute, Simona, 2015. "Assessing the impact of the National Cycle Network and physical activity lifestyle on cycling behaviour in England," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 425-437.
    17. Arthur Caplan & John Gilbert, 2010. "Can fighting grade inflation help the bottom line?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 17(17), pages 1663-1667.
    18. Mozhaeva, Irina, 2022. "Inequalities in utilization of institutional care among older people in Estonia," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(7), pages 704-714.
    19. repec:lan:wpaper:2935 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Ronelle Burger & Canh Thien Dang & Trudy Owens, 2017. "Better performing NGOs do report more accurately: Evidence from investigating Ugandan NGO financial accounts," Discussion Papers 2017-10, University of Nottingham, CREDIT.
    21. Luis Orea & David Roibás & Alan Wall, 2004. "Choosing the Technical Efficiency Orientation to Analyze Firms' Technology: A Model Selection Test Approach," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 51-71, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:somere:v:48:y:2019:i:3:p:561-587. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.