Are labor unions important for business cycle fluctuations? Lessons from Bulgaria

Artikel

In this paper we investigate the quantitative importance of collective bargaining agreements for the observed fluctuations in Bulgarian labor markets. Following Maffezzoli (2001), we introduce a monopoly union into a real-business-cycle model with government sector. We calibrate the model to Bulgarian data for the period following the introduction of the currency board arrangement (1999-2018), and compare and contrast it to a model without unions. We fi nd that the sequential bargaining procedure between the monopoly union and the stand-in rm produces an important internal propagation mechanism within the theoretical setup, which allows the monopoly model to fi t data better than the alternative framework with perfectly-competitive labor markets.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Journal: Eurasian Economic Review ; ISSN: 2147-429X ; Volume: 10 ; Year: 2019 ; Issue: 1 ; Pages: 143–161- ; Heidelberg: Springer

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity ; Business Fluctuations; Cycles ; Labor Demand ; Trade Unions: Objectives, Structure, and Effects
• Subject: business cycles ; general equilibrium ; labor unions ; indivisible labor ; involuntary unemployment

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Vasilev, Aleksandar
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Springer ; ZBW – Leibniz Information Centre for Economics
• (where): Heidelberg
• (when): 2019

Further information

• DOI: doi:10.1007/s40822-019-00139-9
• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/203180
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET