Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/216487 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2020
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 13175
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Income inequality has been lower in periods when trade unionism has been strong. Using observations on wages by occupation, by geography, and by gender in collective bargaining contracts from the 1940s to the 1970s, patterns in movements of wage differentials are revealed. As wages increased, some contracts maintained relative wage differentials constant, some maintained absolute differences in wages constant, others combined these two patterns, and some did not reveal an obvious pattern. The patterns persisted even as price inflation increased in the 1970s. The dominant pattern implies a reduction in inequality as usually measured.
Subjects: 
income inequality
wage differentials
bargaining
trade unions
JEL: 
J31
J51
N32
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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