Knowledge that Transforms

The large literature on labor‐market rent sharing consists of closed economy analyses. In this article we examine whether profits are shared across borders and also conditioned by international linkages that help shape economic openness. In a sample of 1,014 Canadian manufacturing union contracts from 1980 through 1992, we find that U.S. industry profitability affects Canadian wage outcomes and that the pattern of rent sharing varies significantly across international linkages, including multinational ownership, union type, and trade barriers. There seems to be international rent sharing, with profit sharing across borders conditioned by firm‐ and industry‐level institutions.

This article studies a particular kind of gaming responses to explicit incentives in a large government organization. The gaming responses we consider occur when agents strategically report their performance outcomes to maximize their awards. An important contribution of this work is to examine whether this behavior diverts resources (e.g., agents’ time) from productive activities or whether it simply reflects an accounting phenomenon. We evaluate the efficiency impact of the behavior we identify and find that it has a negative impact on the true goal of the organization.

To get a more complete picture of how labor supply is affected by economic incentives, the effects on absenteeism should be taken into account. In particular, absenteeism due to sick leave can be considerable. We examine whether the level of sick leave compensation affects sick leave behavior. Using long time series data (1955–99) for Sweden with numerous changes of the compensation level, we generally find strong effects. Reforms implying more generous compensation for sick leave tend to be associated with permanent increases in sick leave, and vice versa. These findings are reinforced in a panel study covering the 1983–91 period.

In the Netherlands, the average exit rate out of welfare is dramatically low. Most welfare recipients have to comply with guidelines on job search effort that are imposed by the welfare agency. If they do not, then a sanction in the form of a temporary benefit reduction can be imposed. This article investigates the effect of such sanctions on the transition rate from welfare to work using a unique set of rich register data on welfare recipients. We find that the imposition of sanctions substantially increases the individual transition rate from welfare to work.