IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/feddwp/8807.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Unionization and unemployment rates: a re-examination of Olson's labor cartelization hypothesis

Author

Listed:
  • William C. Gruben
  • Keith R. Phillips

Abstract

This paper presents a test of Mancur 0lson's theory of the role that labor cartelization plays in determining interregional variations in unemployment rates. In Olson's theory, the regional degree of labor cartelization contributes to interregional variations in unemployment rates. We show that Olson's theory may be validated in the context of an empirical model that accommodates not only his theory, but also a competing hypothesis due to Freeman and Medoff, as well as business-cycle and sectoral shift related explanations of interregional variations in unemployment rates. Nevertheless, our results also offer partial substantiation of the Freeman and Medoff hypothesis. According to Freeman and Medoff, the positive relation between variation in degrees of unionization and unemployment rates among geographic regions may reflect the concentration of unions in older industrial parts of the economy.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • William C. Gruben & Keith R. Phillips, 1988. "Unionization and unemployment rates: a re-examination of Olson's labor cartelization hypothesis," Working Papers 8807, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:feddwp:8807
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dallasfed.org/assets/documents/research/papers/1988/wp8807.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lilien, David M, 1982. "Sectoral Shifts and Cyclical Unemployment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(4), pages 777-793, August.
    2. Todaro, Michael P, 1969. "A Model for Labor Migration and Urban Unemployment in Less Developed Countries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 59(1), pages 138-148, March.
    3. Blanchflower, D. & Millward, N. & Oswald, A., 1989. "Unionization And Employment Behaviour," Papers 339, London School of Economics - Centre for Labour Economics.
    4. Edward Montgomery, 1986. "Employment and unemployment effects of unions," Working Papers (Old Series) 8601, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    5. William C. Gruben & Keith R. Phillips, 1986. "Understanding the Texas unemployment rate," Economic and Financial Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, issue Nov, pages 17-30.
    6. Ellen R. Rissman, 1987. "Wage growth and sectoral shifts: new evidence on the stability of the Phillips curve," Staff Memoranda 87-1, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    7. Fred Lazar, 1977. "Regional Unemployment Rate Disparities in Canada: Some Possible Explanations," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 10(1), pages 112-129, February.
    8. Lucas, Robert Jr. & Prescott, Edward C., 1974. "Equilibrium search and unemployment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 188-209, February.
    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. Carolyn Sherwood-Call, 1990. "Assessing regional economic stability: a portfolio approach," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Win, pages 17-26.

    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. Herrendorf, Berthold & Rogerson, Richard & Valentinyi, Ákos, 2014. "Growth and Structural Transformation," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 6, pages 855-941, Elsevier.
    2. Bauer, Anja & Keveloh, Kristin & Mamertino, Mariano & Weber, Enzo, 2020. "Competing for jobs: How COVID-19 changes search behaviour in the labour market," IAB Discussion Paper 202033, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    3. Giovanni Gallipoli & Gianluigi Pelloni, 2013. "Macroeconomic Effects of Job Reallocations: A Survey," Review of Economic Analysis, Digital Initiatives at the University of Waterloo Library, vol. 5(2), pages 127-176, December.
    4. Andrew Figura, 2003. "The effect of restructuring on unemployment," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2003-56, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    5. Jovanovic, Boyan & Moffitt, Robert, 1990. "An Estimate of a Sectoral Model of Labor Mobility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(4), pages 827-852, August.
    6. Charles T. Carlstrom, 1987. "Implicit contracts, on-the-job search and involuntary unemployment," Working Papers (Old Series) 8712, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    7. Wesselbaum, Dennis, 2011. "Sector-specific productivity shocks in a matching model," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 28(6), pages 2674-2682.
    8. Bachmann Ronald & Burda Michael C., 2010. "Sectoral Transformation, Turbulence and Labor Market Dynamics in Germany," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 37-59, February.
    9. Shin, Kwanho, 1997. "Sectoral shocks and movement costs: Effects on employment and welfare," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 21(2-3), pages 449-471.
    10. Greenwood, Jeremy & MacDonald, Glenn M & Zhang, Guang-Jia, 1996. "The Cyclical Behavior of Job Creation and Job Destruction: A Sectoral Model," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 7(1), pages 95-112, January.
    11. Álvarez de Toledo, Pablo & Núñez, Fernando & Usabiaga, Carlos, 2014. "An empirical approach on labour segmentation. Applications with individual duration data," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 252-267.
    12. Carlos Usabiaga & Pablo Álvarez de Toledo & Fernando Núñez, 2013. "Labour Market Segmentation, Clusters, Mobility And Unemployment Duration With Individual Microdata," EcoMod2013 5688, EcoMod.
    13. Simona E. Cociuba & James C. MacGee, 2018. "Demographics and Sectoral Reallocations: A Search Theory with Immobile Workers," UWO Department of Economics Working Papers 20182, University of Western Ontario, Department of Economics.
    14. Roberto Leombruni & Roberto Quaranta, 2002. "The Unemployment Route to Versatility," LABORatorio R. Revelli Working Papers Series 16, LABORatorio R. Revelli, Centre for Employment Studies.
    15. Altonji, Joseph G & Ham, John C, 1990. "Variation in Employment Growth in Canada: The Role of External, National, Regional, and Industrial Factors," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 8(1), pages 198-236, January.
    16. Steven J. Davis & John Haltiwanger, 1992. "Gross Job Creation, Gross Job Destruction, and Employment Reallocation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 107(3), pages 819-863.
    17. P. K. Trivedi & G. M. Baker, 1985. "Equilibrium Unemployment in Australia: Concepts and Measurement," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 61(3), pages 629-643, September.
    18. Kilponen, Juha, 2000. "On the Efficiency of Job and Income Protection in the Dynamic Labour Markets," Discussion Papers 219, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    19. Anja Bauer & Ian King, 2015. "The Hartz Reforms, the German Miracle, and the Reallocation Puzzle," Discussion Papers Series 550, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    20. Herz, Benedikt, 2017. "Specific Human Capital and Wait Unemployment," MPRA Paper 76777, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Unemployment; Labor unions;

    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:fip:feddwp:8807. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/frbdaus.html .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.