IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/ifwkie/1448.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

More evidence on the puzzle of interindustry wage differentials: the case of West Germany

Author

Listed:
  • Fels, Joachim
  • Gundlach, Erich

Abstract

In West Germany workers with similar skills earn different wages according to the industry in which they are employed. This finding is no surprise given the institutional rigidities of the West German labor market. But the similarity of the interindustry wage structures in West Germany and in the U.S. points to a puzzle since these countries exhibit totally different labor market institutions. Typical high-wage industries in both countries are motor vehicles and petroleum refining. Furthermore, large correlations of wages between any two qualification groups of workers within an industry in both countries cannot easily be explained by standard neoclassical labor market theories. Once alternative theories are accepted, the economic policy prescriptions regarding the labor market become very different.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Fels, Joachim & Gundlach, Erich, 1990. "More evidence on the puzzle of interindustry wage differentials: the case of West Germany," Open Access Publications from Kiel Institute for the World Economy 1448, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ifwkie:1448
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/1448/3/259770132.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yellen, Janet L, 1984. "Efficiency Wage Models of Unemployment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(2), pages 200-205, May.
    2. Schmidt, Peter & Sickles, Robin, 1977. "Some Further Evidence on the Use of the Chow Test under Heteroskedasticity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 45(5), pages 1293-1298, July.
    3. Toyoda, Toshihisa, 1974. "Use of the Chow Test under Heteroscedasticity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 42(3), pages 601-608, May.
    4. Kahneman, Daniel & Knetsch, Jack L & Thaler, Richard, 1986. "Fairness as a Constraint on Profit Seeking: Entitlements in the Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 728-741, September.
    5. Gibbons, R. & Katz, L., 1989. "Does Unmeasured Ability Explain Inter-Industry Wage Differences," Working papers 543, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Economics.
    6. William T. Dickens & Lawrence F. Katz, 1987. "Inter-Industry Wage Differences and Theories of Wage Determination," NBER Working Papers 2271, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Breusch, T S & Pagan, A R, 1979. "A Simple Test for Heteroscedasticity and Random Coefficient Variation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(5), pages 1287-1294, September.
    8. Thaler, Richard H, 1989. "Interindustry Wage Differentials," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(2), pages 181-193, Spring.
    9. Lucas, Robert E, Jr, 1980. "Methods and Problems in Business Cycle Theory," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 12(4), pages 696-715, November.
    10. Lawrence F. Katz, 1986. "Efficiency Wage Theories: A Partial Evaluation," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1986, Volume 1, pages 235-290, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Krueger, Alan B & Summers, Lawrence H, 1988. "Efficiency Wages and the Inter-industry Wage Structure," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(2), pages 259-293, March.
    12. Gundlach, Erich, 1986. "Gibt es genügend Lohndifferenzierung in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland?," Open Access Publications from Kiel Institute for the World Economy 1307, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    13. Lawrence F. Katz & Lawrence H. Summers, 1989. "Industry Rents: Evidence and Implications," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 20(1989 Micr), pages 209-290.
    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. Bernd Fitzenberger & Claudia Kurz, 2003. "New insights on earnings trends across skill groups and industries in West Germany," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 479-514, July.
    2. Paqué, Karl-Heinz, 1991. "Structural wage rigidity in West Germany 1950-1989: Some new econometric evidence," Kiel Working Papers 489, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    3. Katharine G. Abraham & Susan Houseman, 1995. "Earnings Inequality in Germany," NBER Chapters, in: Differences and Changes in Wage Structures, pages 371-404, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Carl Campbell, 1991. "Tests of efficiency wage theory and contract theory with disaggregated data from the U.S," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 127(1), pages 98-118, March.

    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. Schlicht, Ekkehart, . "Job Rents in a Stylized Labor Market," Chapters in Economics,, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    2. Paqué, Karl-Heinz, 1991. "Structural wage rigidity in West Germany 1950-1989: Some new econometric evidence," Kiel Working Papers 489, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    3. Eduardo Monte Jorge Hey Martins & Jaylson Jair da Silveira & Gilberto Tadeu Lima, 2021. "Heterogeneity in the extraction of labor from labor power and persistence of wage inequality," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(2), pages 260-285, May.
    4. William T. Dickens & Kevin Lang, 1992. "Labor Market Segmentation Theory: Reconsidering the Evidence," NBER Working Papers 4087, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Jean-Pierre DANTHINE & André KURMANN, 2004. "Efficiency Wages Revisited: The Internal Reference Perspective (new version)," Cahiers de Recherches Economiques du Département d'économie 04.09, Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, Département d’économie, revised Jun 2005.
    6. Alan Carruth & Bill Collier & Andy Dickerson, 1999. "Inter-industry Wage Differences and Individual Heterogeneity: How Competitive is Wage Setting in the UK?," Studies in Economics 9914, School of Economics, University of Kent.
    7. Katarzyna Budnik, 2012. "Do those who stay work less? On the impact of emigration on the measured TFP in Poland," NBP Working Papers 113, Narodowy Bank Polski.
    8. David Card & Ana Rute Cardoso & Joerg Heining & Patrick Kline, 2018. "Firms and Labor Market Inequality: Evidence and Some Theory," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(S1), pages 13-70.
    9. Veronique Genre & Karsten Kohn & Daphne Momferatou, 2011. "Understanding inter-industry wage structures in the euro area," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(11), pages 1299-1313.
    10. Robert Plasman & François Rycx & Ilan Tojerow, 2006. "Industry wage differentials, unobserved ability, and rent-sharing: evidence from matched employer-employee, 1992-2005," DULBEA Working Papers 06-14.RS, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    11. Görzig, Bernd & Gornig, Martin & Werwatz, Axel, 2006. "East Germany's wage gap: A non-parametric decomposition based on establishment characteristics," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2006-044, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    12. Bhaskar, V. & To, Ted, 2003. "Oligopsony and the distribution of wages," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 371-399, April.
    13. Kaltenberg, Mary & Foster-McGregor, Neil, 2020. "The impact of automation on inequality across Europe," MERIT Working Papers 2020-009, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    14. Valeria Cirillo & Matteo Sostero & Federico Tamagni, 2017. "Innovation and within-firm wage inequalities: empirical evidence from major European countries," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(5), pages 468-491, July.
    15. Aleksandra Matuszewska-Janica & Dorota Witkowska, 2021. "Differences between determinants of men and women monthly wages across fourteen European Union states," Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, Institute of Economic Research, vol. 16(3), pages 503-531, September.
    16. Assaad, Ragui & Tunali, Insan, 2002. "Wage formation and recurrent unemployment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 17-61, February.
    17. Ms. Prachi Mishra & Mr. Utsav Kumar, 2005. "Trade Liberalization and Wage Inequality: Evidence From India," IMF Working Papers 2005/020, International Monetary Fund.
    18. Robert Gibbons & Lawrence F. Katz & Thomas Lemieux & Daniel Parent, 2005. "Comparative Advantage, Learning, and Sectoral Wage Determination," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(4), pages 681-724, October.
    19. Philip Du Caju & François Rycx & Ilan Tojerow, 2011. "Wage Structure Effects of International Trade: Evidence from a Small Open Economy," Working Papers CEB 11-011, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    20. Meiyan Wang & Fang Cai, 2006. "Gender Wage Differentials in China's Urban Labour Market," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2006-146, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).

    More about this item

    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:zbw:ifwkie:1448. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iwkiede.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.