Narrow Results

This paper investigates the roles played by a macro-focused union in the stabilization of the employment level and wages during periods of demand shocks. A macro focused union sets the wage at the level which maximizes employment and provides union benefits to union members to counter free ridership. We set up a solid micro-foundation to derive the industry labor demands in normal periods and in periods with shocks. We argue that the roles played by the macro focused union lead to a more stable employment level which is beneficial to both the employers and employees.

Price differentials, among other factors, persuade many residents of Northern Mexico to shop in the Southwestern United States border region. Employment patterns in the latter region are studied using a set of control variables and two indicators that are likely to influence cross-border shopping patterns. The first is a real exchange rate index, which captures changes in relative prices in the United States and Mexico. The second is real per capita gross state product in Mexican states adjacent to the international boundary. Both of these variables are found to impact retail and restaurant employment in the United States border zone, confirming that cross-border shopping influences labor market conditions in that region. Furthermore, the estimated elasticities vary across retail sub-sectors in ways that are generally consistent with prior research. Overall, the results suggest that economic setbacks in Northern Mexico and real peso depreciations are likely to have adverse consequences for important sectors of border economies in the United States.

Human resources for health (HRH) play a central role in the delivery of health care services. Global health policymakers need to understand the key factors that impact HRH, because shortages adversely impact population health and surpluses inefficiently consume a country's resources. This chapter describes key issues surrounding the global health workforce and HRH planning. It begins by describing the HRH workforce and the supply of HRH workers across countries by income level. An economic framework of supply and demand is presented, along with the factors that affect the demand for and supply of HRH. The chapter then delves into the challenge of ensuring that HRH are well distributed across and within countries, including the issue of international migration. Next, it discusses the roles of the public sector, private sector, and donor organizations in HRH planning. Although, there has been significant progress over recent decades in the development of HRH severe shortages and maldistribution remain. Moreover, the future workforce will need to be designed to meet the care needs of an aging population that will become increasingly burdened by chronic conditions and mental health disorders. These trends require proactive HRH planning by global health policymakers.

Many European countries restrict immigration from new EU member countries. The rationale is to avoid adverse wage and employment effects. We quantify these effects for Germany. Following Borjas (in Q J Econ CXVIII(4): 1335–1374, 2003), we estimate a structural model of labor demand, based on elasticities of substitution between workers with different experience levels and education. We allow for unemployment which we model in a price-wage-setting framework. Simulating a counterfactual scenario without restrictions for migration from new EU members countries in Germany, we find moderate negative wage and employment effects for incumbent foreigners, but positive effects for natives. Our results indicate that for the native German population as a whole the immigration restrictions are not welfare enhancing.