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The Labor Wedge: MRS vs. MPN

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  • Loukas Karabarbounis

Abstract

Do fluctuations of the labor wedge, defined as the gap between the firm's marginal product of labor (MPN) and the household's marginal rate of substitution (MRS), reflect fluctuations of the gap between the MPN and the real wage or fluctuations of the gap between the real wage and the MRS? For many countries and most forcefully for the United States, fluctuations of the labor wedge predominantly reflect fluctuations of the gap between the real wage and the MRS. As a result, business cycle theories of the labor wedge should primarily focus on improving the household side of the labor market. Explanations of the labor wedge based on departures of the representative firm's MPN from the real wage are rejected by the data because the labor share of income is not strongly procyclical.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 19015.

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Date of creation: May 2013
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Publication status: published as Loukas Karabarbounis, 2014. "The Labor Wedge: MRS vs. MPN," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(2), pages 206-223, April.
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19015
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Find related papers by JEL classification:
  • E2 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment
  • E20 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
  • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
  • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

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Cited by:

  1. Cociuba, Simona E. & Ueberfeldt, Alexander, 2015. "Heterogeneity and long-run changes in aggregate hours and the labor wedge," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 75-95.
  2. David Coble, 2015. "The Labor Wedge: New Facts Based on US Microdata," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 751, Central Bank of Chile.
  3. Razzak, 2015. "Wage, productivity and unemployment: microeconomics theory and macroeconomics data," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(58), pages 6284-6300, December.
  4. Klein, Mathias & Krause, Christopher, 2014. "Income Redistribution, Consumer Credit,and Keeping up with the Riches," Ruhr Economic Papers 509, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
  5. Kozlowski, Julian & Veldkamp, Laura & Venkateswaran, Venky, 2016. "The Tail that Wags the Economy: Belief-Driven Business Cycles and Persistent Stagnation," CEPR Discussion Papers 11352, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  6. Mark Bils & Peter J. Klenow & Benjamin A. Malin, 2014. "Resurrecting the Role of the Product Market Wedge in Recessions," NBER Working Papers 20555, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  7. Epstein, Brendan & Mukherjee, Rahul & Ramnath, Shanthi, 2014. "Taxes and International Risk Sharing," International Finance Discussion Papers 1110, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
  8. Krause, Christopher & Klein, Mathias, 2015. "Income redistribution, consumer credit, and keeping up with the Riches," Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 112816, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
  9. David Coble & Sebastián Faúndez, 2016. "The labor wedge and business cycles in Chile," Journal Economía Chilena (The Chilean Economy), Central Bank of Chile, vol. 19(1), pages 38-56, April.
  10. Skibińska, Małgorzata, 2016. "What drives the labour wedge? A comparison between CEE countries and the Euro Area," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 148-161.
  11. Bils, Mark, 2016. "Deducing markups from stockout behavior," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 320-331.
  12. Karabarbounis, Loukas, 2014. "Home production, labor wedges, and international business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 68-84.
  13. Yaniv Yedid-Levi, 2012. "Why Does Employment in All Major Sectors Move Together over the Business Cycle?," 2012 Meeting Papers 677, Society for Economic Dynamics.
  14. Małgorzata Skibińska, 2015. "What drives the labour wedge? A comparison between CEE countries and the Euro Area," National Bank of Poland Working Papers 220, National Bank of Poland, Economic Institute.
  15. Atesagaoglu, Orhan Erem & Elgin, Ceyhun, 2015. "Cyclicality of labor wedge and informal sector," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 141-146.
  16. Saki Bigio & Jennifer La’O, 2016. "Financial Frictions in Production Networks," NBER Working Papers 22212, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

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