This study examines occupational licensing in the United States using a specially designed national labor force survey. Estimates from the survey indicated that 35% of employees were either licensed or certified by the government and that 29% were licensed. Another 3% stated that all who worked in their job would eventually be required to be certified or licensed, bringing the total that are or eventually must be licensed or certified by government to 38%. We find that licensing is associated with about 18% higher wages but that the effect of governmental certification on pay is much smaller.

We show that occupational licensing has significant negative effects on labor market fluidity, defined as cross-occupation mobility, and positive effects on wage growth. We find that occupational licensing represents a barrier to entry for both nonemployed workers and employed ones. The effect is more prominent for employed workers than those entering from nonemployment. We also find that average wage growth is higher for licensed workers than nonlicensed workers. We find significant heterogeneity in the licensing effect across different occupation groups. These results hold across various data sources, time spans, and indicators of being licensed.

This study investigates the impact of union organization on the wages and labor practices of establishments newly organized in the 1980s. It uses a research design in which establishments are "paired" with their closest nonunion competitor. It finds that, unionism had only a modest effect on wages in the newly organized plants, which contrasts sharply with the huge union wage impact found in cross-section comparisons of union and nonunion individuals, but unionism substantially alters several personnel practices, creating grievance systems, greater seniority protection, and job bidding and posting. That newly organized establishments adopt union working conditions but grant only modest wage increases suggests that "collective voice" rather than monopoly wage gains is the key to understanding new unionism.