IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp4335.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Setting the Minimum Wage

Author

Listed:
  • Boeri, Tito

    (Bocconi University)

Abstract

The process leading to the setting of the minimum wage so far has been fairly overlooked by economists. This paper suggests that this is a serious limitation as the setting regime contributes to explain cross-country variation in the fine-tuning of the minimum wage, hence in the way in which the trade-off between reducing poverty among working people and shutting down low productivity jobs is addressed. There are two common ways of setting national minimum wages: they are either government legislated or are the outcome of collective bargaining agreements, which are extended erga omnes to all workers. We develop a simple model relating the level of the minimum wage to the setting regime. Next, we exploit a new data set on minimum wages in 66 countries that had already or introduced a minimum wage in the period 1981-2005 to test the implications of the model. We find that a Government legislated minimum wage is lower than a wage floor set within collective agreements. This effect survives to several robustness checks and hints at a causal relation between the setting regime and the level of the minimum wage.

Suggested Citation

  • Boeri, Tito, 2009. "Setting the Minimum Wage," IZA Discussion Papers 4335, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp4335
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp4335.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Assar Lindbeck & Sten Nyberg & Jörgen W. Weibull, 1999. "Social Norms and Economic Incentives in the Welfare State," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 1-35.
    2. Dani Rodrik, 1999. "Democracies Pay Higher Wages," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(3), pages 707-738.
    3. Silberman, Jonathan I & Durden, Garey C, 1976. "Determining Legislative Preferences on the Minimum Wage: An Economic Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 84(2), pages 317-329, April.
    4. Christopher J. Flinn, 2006. "Minimum Wage Effects on Labor Market Outcomes under Search, Matching, and Endogenous Contact Rates," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(4), pages 1013-1062, July.
    5. Yann Algan & Pierre Cahuc, 2007. "Social Attitudes and Economic Development : an Epidemiological Approach," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-01066088, HAL.
    6. Leif Danziger, 2009. "The elasticity of labor demand and the minimum wage," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 22(3), pages 757-772, July.
    7. Tito Boeri & Michael C. Burda, 2009. "Preferences for Collective Versus Individualised Wage Setting," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(540), pages 1440-1463, October.
    8. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/8814 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. André Sapir & Marco Buti, 1998. "Economic policy in EMU," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/8078, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    10. Neumark, David & Wascher, William L., 2007. "Minimum Wages and Employment," Foundations and Trends(R) in Microeconomics, now publishers, vol. 3(1–2), pages 1-182, March.
    11. André Blais & Jean-Michel Cousineau & Kenneth McRoberts, 1989. "The determinants of minimum wage rates," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 62(1), pages 15-24, July.
    12. Ashenfelter, Orley & Card, David, 1985. "Using the Longitudinal Structure of Earnings to Estimate the Effect of Training Programs," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(4), pages 648-660, November.
    13. William Brown, 2009. "The Process of Fixing the British National Minimum Wage, 1997–2007," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 47(2), pages 429-443, June.
    14. Arthur J. Hosios, 1990. "On The Efficiency of Matching and Related Models of Search and Unemployment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 57(2), pages 279-298.
    15. Boeri, Tito & Macis, Mario, 2008. "Do Unemployment Benefits Promote or Hinder Structural Change?," IZA Discussion Papers 3371, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Boeri, Tito & Macis, Mario, 2010. "Do unemployment benefits promote or hinder job reallocation?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 109-125, September.
    17. Nickell, S J & Andrews, M, 1983. "Unions, Real Wages and Employment in Britain 1951-79," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 35(0), pages 183-206, Supplemen.
    18. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/8813 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/8814 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Uri, Noel D & Mixon, J Wilson, Jr, 1980. "An Economic Analysis of the Determinants of Minimum Wage Voting Behavior," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(1), pages 167-177, April.
    21. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/8813 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Marco Buti & André Sapir (ed.), 2002. "EMU and Economic Policy in Europe," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2871.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Tito Boeri & Jan van Ours, 2013. "The Economics of Imperfect Labor Markets: Second Edition," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10142.
    2. Eliav Danziger & Leif Danziger, 2015. "A Pareto-improving Minimum Wage," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 82(326), pages 236-252, April.
    3. Gorry, Aspen, 2013. "Minimum wages and youth unemployment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 57-75.
    4. Moser, Christoph & Stähler, Nikolai, 2009. "Spillover effects of minimum wages in a two-sector search model," Discussion Paper Series 1: Economic Studies 2009,01, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    5. Boeri, Tito & Macis, Mario, 2008. "Do Unemployment Benefits Promote or Hinder Structural Change?," IZA Discussion Papers 3371, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Petra E. Todd & Weilong Zhang, 2022. "Distributional Effects of Local Minimum Wages: A Spatial Job Search Approach," PIER Working Paper Archive 22-027, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.
    7. Marianna Kudlyak & Murat Tasci & Didem Tuzemen, 2019. "Minimum Wage Increases and Vacancies," Working Papers 19-30R, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, revised 21 Apr 2022.
    8. Mark Gertler & Antonella Trigari, 2009. "Unemployment Fluctuations with Staggered Nash Wage Bargaining," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 117(1), pages 38-86, February.
    9. Christopher Flinn & Ahu Gemici & Steven Laufer, 2017. "Search, Matching, and Training," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 25, pages 260-297, April.
    10. Lee, David & Saez, Emmanuel, 2012. "Optimal minimum wage policy in competitive labor markets," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(9-10), pages 739-749.
    11. Sotiris Theodoropoulos, 2005. "Asymmetric Shocks, Structural Rigidities and Adjustment Capability in EMU - A Review," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3-4), pages 3-20.
    12. Tortorice, Daniel L., 2013. "Endogenous separation, wage rigidity and the dynamics of unemployment," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 38(PB), pages 179-191.
    13. Jackson, Paul, 2023. "Equilibrium underemployment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    14. Fernández-Villaverde, Jesús & Drautzburg, Thorsten & Guerron-Quintana, Pablo A., 2017. "Political Distribution Risk and Aggregate Fluctuations," CEPR Discussion Papers 12187, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Pinoli, Sara, 2008. "Rational Expectations and the Puzzling No-Effect of the Minimum Wage," MPRA Paper 11405, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Tito Boeri & J. Ignacio Conde-Ruiz & Vincenzo Galasso, "undated". "Cross-skill Redistribution and the Tradeoff between Unemployment Benefits and Employment Protection," Working Papers 2004-26, FEDEA.
    17. Hamzeh Arabzadeh, 2016. "The political economy of twin deficits and wage setting centralization," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2016017, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    18. Launov, Andrey & Wälde, Klaus, 2016. "The employment effect of reforming a public employment agency," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 140-164.
    19. Simon, Andrew & Wilson, Matthew, 2021. "Optimal minimum wage setting in a federal system," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    20. Sunakawa, Takeki, 2012. "Efficiency in a search and matching model with right-to-manage bargaining," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 679-682.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    statutory minimum; collective bargaining; minimum wages;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J41 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Labor Contracts
    • J42 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Monopsony; Segmented Labor Markets

    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:iza:izadps:dp4335. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.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.