IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/yca/wpaper/2008_04.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Wages, Fringe Benefits and Efficiency in Union-Firm Bargaining

Author

Listed:
  • Elie Appelbaum

    (York University, Canada)

Abstract

This paper provides an efficient union-firm bargaining solution within the right to manage framework, by separating efficiency and distribution considerations through bargaining over wage and fringe benefits. We show that without insurance considerations, efficiency is achieved by equating the wage and workers’ opportunity cost and providing the union with a surplus share in accordance with its bargaining power. We also show that with insurance considerations, the optimal contract, again, equates the wage and workers’ opportunity cost, but it also provides full insurance. There is empirical evidence that fringe benefits are, indeed, common and play an important role in union contracts.

Suggested Citation

  • Elie Appelbaum, 2008. "Wages, Fringe Benefits and Efficiency in Union-Firm Bargaining," Working Papers 2008_04, York University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:yca:wpaper:2008_04
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dept.econ.yorku.ca/research/workingPapers/working_papers/2008/labour-bar.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:bla:econom:v:62:y:1995:i:248:p:551-64 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Oswald, A. J., 1995. "Efficient contracts are on the labour demand curve: Theory and facts," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 102-102, March.
    3. Booth,Alison L., 1994. "The Economics of the Trade Union," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521468398, November.
    4. Martin J. Osborne & Ariel Rubinstein, 2005. "Bargaining and Markets," Levine's Bibliography 666156000000000515, UCLA Department of Economics.
    5. Besancenot, Damien & Vranceanu, Radu, 1999. "A trade union model with endogenous militancy: interpreting the French case," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(3), pages 355-373, September.
    6. repec:bla:econom:v:51:y:1984:i:202:p:141-49 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Simon P. Anderson & Michael Devereux, 1989. "Profit-Sharing and Optimal Labour Contracts," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 22(2), pages 425-433, May.
    8. Stephen Nickell & Sushil Wadhwani, 1991. "Employment Determination in British Industry: Investigations Using Micro-Data," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(5), pages 955-969.
    9. Oswald, Andrew J, 1982. "Trade Unions, Wages and Unemployment: What Can Simple Models Tell Us?," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 34(3), pages 526-545, November.
    10. Oswald, Andrew J & Turnbull, Peter J, 1985. "Pay and Employment Determination in Britain: What Are Labour," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 1(2), pages 80-97, Summer.
    11. Jean Tirole, 1988. "The Theory of Industrial Organization," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262200716, December.
    12. Booth, Alison L, 1993. "Layoffs with Payoffs: A Bargaining Model of Union Wage and Severance Pay Determination," CEPR Discussion Papers 843, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. Bughin, Jacques, 1996. "Trade Unions and Firms' Product Market Power," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(3), pages 289-307, September.
    14. MaCurdy, Thomas E & Pencavel, John H, 1986. "Testing between Competing Models of Wage and Employment Determination in Unionized Markets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(3), pages 3-39, 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. Elie Appelbaum, 2009. "Alternating Offers Union-Firm Bargaining: Order of Play and Efficiency," Working Papers 2009_02, York University, Department of Economics.

    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. Elie Appelbaum, 2009. "Alternating Offers Union-Firm Bargaining: Order of Play and Efficiency," Working Papers 2009_02, York University, Department of Economics.
    2. Andrews, Martyn & Harrison, Alan, 1998. "Testing for Efficient Contracts in Unionized Labour Markets," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(3), pages 171-200, July.
    3. Appelbaum, Elie, 2011. "Union-firm bargaining: Order of play and efficiency," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 235-245, March.
    4. António Brandão & Joana Pinho, 2018. "Productivity Shocks in a Union‐Duopoly Model," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 86(6), pages 722-756, December.
    5. Elie Appelbaum, 2004. "Union militancy and the probability of strikes," Working Papers 2004_4, York University, Department of Economics.
    6. Toke Aidt & Zafiris Tzannatos, 2002. "Unions and Collective Bargaining : Economic Effects in a Global Environment," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 15241, April.
    7. Nicholas Lawson, 2011. "Is Collective Bargaining Pareto Efficient? A Survey of the Literature," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 32(3), pages 282-304, September.
    8. Marco Guerrazzi & Pier Giuseppe Giribone, 2021. "Dynamic wage bargaining and labour market fluctuations: the role of productivity shocks," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 1(8), pages 1-20, August.
    9. Fuest, Clemens & Thum, Marcel, 2001. "Immigration and skill formation in unionised labour markets," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 557-573, September.
    10. Shakhnovich Ruvim & Yudashkina Galina, 2001. "Wage-Setting and Employment Behavior of Enterprises during the Period of Economic Transition," EERC Working Paper Series 01-04e, EERC Research Network, Russia and CIS.
    11. Frank Scharr, 2005. "Tarifbindung, Rententeilung und Konzessionsverträge als Einflussgrößen der Lohnhöhe in Unternehmen : eine Untersuchung mit Mikrodaten für thüringische Firmen," ifo Dresden Studien, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 39, February.
    12. Peter J. Luke & Mark E. Schaffer, 1999. "Wage Determination in Russia: An Econometric Investigation," CERT Discussion Papers 9908, Centre for Economic Reform and Transformation, Heriot Watt University.
    13. Matthias Strifler & Thomas Beissinger, 2016. "Fairness Considerations in Labor Union Wage Setting – A Theoretical Analysis," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 63(3), pages 303-330, July.
    14. Almas Heshmati & Ilham Haouas, 2004. "The effects of union wage-settings on firms' production factor decisions," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(7), pages 415-420.
    15. Justus Haucap & Christian Wey, 2004. "Unionisation structures and innovation incentives," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(494), pages 149-165, March.
    16. Harbaugh, Rick, 2005. "The effect of employee stock ownership on wage and employment bargaining," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 565-583, September.
    17. Mukherjee, Arijit & Zeng, Chenhang, 2022. "Social desirability of entry in a bilateral oligopoly—The implications of (non) sunk costs," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 12-19.
    18. John M. Abowd & Francis Kramarz & David N. Margolis, 1999. "High Wage Workers and High Wage Firms," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(2), pages 251-334, March.
    19. David Mills, 2007. "Quasi-Partnerships in Distribution," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 31(3), pages 155-168, November.
    20. Mohamed Jellal & François-Charles Wolff, 2003. "Privatisation et négociation collective," Revue d’économie du développement, De Boeck Université, vol. 11(1), pages 73-99.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • J5 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining
    • C78 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Bargaining Theory; Matching Theory

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:yca:wpaper:2008_04. 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: Support The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Support to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dyorkca.html .

    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.