Abstract: We study the effect of private-sector unionization on establishment employment and survival. Our empirical strategy extends standard difference-in-differences techniques with regression discontinuity extrapolation methods. We show that unionization decreases an establishment's employment and likelihood of survival. We hypothesize that two reasons for these effects are firms' ability to avoid working with new unions and their overall opposition to unions. We support these new explanations by showing that firms shift production away from newly unionized establishments and that the negative effects are largest when the firm is likely more opposed to the union.

Abstract: I study the effect of noncompete agreements on low-earning workers using a noncompete ban in Austria. The ban increased treated workers’ annual job-to-job transition rate by 0.3 percentage points (a two percent increase). This effect was driven by within-industry job transitions. The reform also disproportionately increased transitions to higher-quality firms and transitions accompanied by earnings gains. However, I do not find that the ban increased treated workers' overall earnings growth rates. This evidence shows that noncompetes in Austria restricted low-earning workers’ job mobility but that this impact was not large enough to affect aggregate mobility or earnings trends.

Abstract: Who gains when firms expand, and do the same individuals bear the costs when firms contract? This paper provides the first joint analysis of the impact of firm demand shocks on workers and owners. We construct a linked firm-worker-owner tax dataset that covers over a quarter of private employment in the U.S. Leveraging export-demand variation and value-added fluctuations as firm-specific demand shocks, we find that the incidence of these shocks is unequal and asymmetric. Individuals in the top 1% of the national income distribution receive about half of the income changes, while those in the bottom 50% receive less than 15%. The unequal incidence arises because firm owners receive most of the income changes from the shocks and are disproportionately in the top of the income distribution. In addition, workers capture only 10% of the gains from positive firm shocks but bear 26% of the losses from negative shocks. The asymmetry is driven by the costs of job loss for workers. These findings show that even skill-neutral firm shocks can disproportionately benefit high-income individuals due to the concentrated nature of business ownership.

Abstract: Nonemployment is often posited as a worker’s outside option in wage setting models such as bargaining and wage posting. The value of nonemployment is therefore a key determinant of wages. We measure the wage effect of changes in the value of nonemployment among initially employed workers. Our quasi-experimental variation in the value of nonemployment arises from four large reforms of unemployment insurance (UI) benefit levels in Austria. We document that wages are insensitive to UI benefit changes: point estimates imply a wage response of less than $0.01 per $1.00 UI benefit increase, and we can reject sensitivities larger than $0.03. The insensitivity holds even among workers with low wages and high predicted unemployment duration, and among job switchers hired out of unemployment. The insensitivity of wages to the nonemployment value presents a puzzle to the widely used Nash bargaining model, which predicts a sensitivity of $0.24–$0.48. Our evidence supports wage-setting models that insulate wages from the value of nonemployment.