IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/lsu/lsuwpp/2015-02.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Democrats and Unions

Author

Abstract

This paper investigates whether the Democratic Party has any significant effects on unions. Employing Regression Discontinuity (RD) approach on gubernatorial elections in U.S. states over the last three decades, we investigate causal effects of Democratic governors on unionization of workers, and unionized workers' working hours and earnings. Surprisingly, we find no significant impact from Democratic governors on union membership and union members' labor-market outcomes.

Suggested Citation

  • Louis-Philippe Beland & Bulent Unel, 2015. "Democrats and Unions," Departmental Working Papers 2015-02, Department of Economics, Louisiana State University.
    • Handle: RePEc:lsu:lsuwpp:2015-02
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.lsu.edu/business/economics/files/workingpapers/pap15_02.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fernando Ferreira & Joseph Gyourko, 2009. "Do Political Parties Matter? Evidence from U.S. Cities," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(1), pages 399-422.
    2. Knight, Brian G., 2000. "Supermajority voting requirements for tax increases: evidence from the states," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 41-67, April.
    3. Timothy Besley & Anne Case, 1995. "Does Electoral Accountability Affect Economic Policy Choices? Evidence from Gubernatorial Term Limits," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(3), pages 769-798.
    4. Edward J. Schumacher, 1999. "What Explains Wage Differences Between Union Members and Covered Nonmembers?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 65(3), pages 493-512, January.
    5. Emin Dinlersoz & Jeremy Greenwood, 2012. "The Rise And Fall Of Unions In The U.S," Working Papers 12-12, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau, revised Jun 2013.
    6. Acemoglu, Daron & Aghion, Philippe & Violante, Giovanni L., 2001. "Deunionization, technical change and inequality," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 229-264, December.
    7. Guido Imbens & Karthik Kalyanaraman, 2012. "Optimal Bandwidth Choice for the Regression Discontinuity Estimator," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(3), pages 933-959.
    8. Amanda Gosling & Thomas Lemieux, 2004. "Labor Market Reforms and Changes in Wage Inequality in the United Kingdom and the United States," NBER Chapters, in: Seeking a Premier Economy: The Economic Effects of British Economic Reforms, 1980–2000, pages 275-312, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Thomas J. Holmes, 1998. "The Effect of State Policies on the Location of Manufacturing: Evidence from State Borders," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(4), pages 667-705, August.
    10. Lee, David S., 2008. "Randomized experiments from non-random selection in U.S. House elections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 675-697, February.
    11. Andrew Gelman & Guido Imbens, 2019. "Why High-Order Polynomials Should Not Be Used in Regression Discontinuity Designs," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(3), pages 447-456, July.
    12. Leigh, Andrew, 2008. "Estimating the impact of gubernatorial partisanship on policy settings and economic outcomes: A regression discontinuity approach," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 256-268, March.
    13. Barry T. Hirsch & Edward J. Schumacher, 1998. "Unions, Wages, and Skills," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 33(1), pages 201-219.
    14. David H. Autor & Lawrence F. Katz & Melissa S. Kearney, 2008. "Trends in U.S. Wage Inequality: Revising the Revisionists," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(2), pages 300-323, May.
    15. McCrary, Justin, 2008. "Manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design: A density test," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 698-714, February.
    16. Card, David, 1996. "The Effect of Unions on the Structure of Wages: A Longitudinal Analysis," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(4), pages 957-979, July.
    17. Louis-Philippe Beland Jr., 2015. "Political Parties and Labor-Market Outcomes: Evidence from US States," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 198-220, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. repec:ces:ifodic:v:14:y:2016:i:1:p:19204333 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Louis-Philippe Beland, 2016. "Political Parties and Economic Outcomes. A Review," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(1), pages 47-54, 05.
    3. Louis-Philippe Beland, 2016. "Political Parties and Economic Outcomes. A Review," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(01), pages 47-54, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Louis-Philippe Beland & Bulent Unel, 2018. "The impact of party affiliation of US governors on immigrants’ labor market outcomes," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 31(2), pages 627-670, April.
    2. Beland, Louis-Philippe & Boucher, Vincent, 2015. "Polluting politics," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 176-181.
    3. Louis‐Philippe Beland & Bulent Unel, 2019. "Politics and entrepreneurship in the US," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(1), pages 33-57, February.
    4. Louis-Philippe Beland & Sara Oloomi, 2017. "Party Affiliation And Public Spending: Evidence From U.S. Governors," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(2), pages 982-995, April.
    5. Louis-Philippe Beland & Ozkan Eren & Bulent Unel, 2015. "Politics and Entrepreneurial Activity in the U.S," Departmental Working Papers 2015-04, Department of Economics, Louisiana State University.
    6. repec:ces:ifodic:v:14:y:2016:i:1:p:19204333 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Quaresima Federico & Santolini Raffaella & Fiorillo Fabio, 2020. "Political affiliation in post-parliamentary careers in Italian public enterprises," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 21(1), pages 35-64, April.
    8. Mauricio Villamizar‐Villegas & Freddy A. Pinzon‐Puerto & Maria Alejandra Ruiz‐Sanchez, 2022. "A comprehensive history of regression discontinuity designs: An empirical survey of the last 60 years," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 1130-1178, September.
    9. Per G. Fredriksson & Le Wang & Patrick L Warren, 2013. "Party Politics, Governors, and Economic Policy," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 80(1), pages 106-126, July.
    10. Niklas Potrafke, 2018. "Government ideology and economic policy-making in the United States—a survey," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 174(1), pages 145-207, January.
    11. Corrado Di Maria & Emiliya Lazarova & Lan Lange, 2024. "Political ‘Colour’ and Firm Behaviour: Evidence from U.S. Power Plants’ Pollution Abatement," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 87(5), pages 1141-1174, May.
    12. Louis-Philippe Beland, 2016. "Political Parties and Economic Outcomes. A Review," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(01), pages 47-54, May.
    13. Niklas Potrafke, 2017. "Government Ideology and Economic Policy-Making in the United States," CESifo Working Paper Series 6444, CESifo.
    14. Louis-Philippe Beland, 2016. "Political Parties and Economic Outcomes. A Review," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(1), pages 47-54, 05.
    15. Gouvêa, Raphael & Girardi, Daniele, 2021. "Partisanship and local fiscal policy: Evidence from Brazilian cities," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    16. Joaquín Artés & Ignacio Jurado, 2018. "Government fragmentation and fiscal deficits: a regression discontinuity approach," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 367-391, June.
    17. Ari Hyytinen & Jaakko Meriläinen & Tuukka Saarimaa & Otto Toivanen & Janne Tukiainen, 2018. "When does regression discontinuity design work? Evidence from random election outcomes," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 9(2), pages 1019-1051, July.
    18. Matthew Doyle & Corrado Di Maria & Ian A. Lange & Emiliya Lazarova, 2016. "Electoral Incentives and Firm Behavior: Evidence from U.S. Power Plant Pollution Abatement," CESifo Working Paper Series 6127, CESifo.
    19. Meriläinen, Jaakko, 2013. "Do Single-Party and Coalition Governments Differ in their Economic Outcomes? Evidence from Finnish Municipalities," Working Papers 51, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    20. Carozzi, Felipe & Repetto, Luca, 2019. "Distributive politics inside the city? The political economy of Spain's Plan E," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 85-106.
    21. Makarin, Alexey & Piqué, Ricardo & Aragón, Fernando, 2020. "National or sub-national parties: Does party geographic scope matter?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:lsu:lsuwpp:2015-02. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/delsuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.