جهانی شدن و موسسات بازار کار : شواهد تجربی بین المللی

A widespread concern is that labor market institutions erode in the course of globalization, which, in turn, decreases employment and wages. By using panel data and cross-sectional data, I investigate the influence of globalization on labor market regulation. I use the indicators of labor market institutions by Gwartney et al. (2012) and the KOF indices of globalization. To deal with potential reverse causality, I employ a system GMM panel estimator and use a constructed trade share as proposed by Frankel and Romer (1999) as an instrumental variable for globalization in cross-sectional models. The results do not show that globalization induced labor market deregulation.

It is often claimed that working conditions of unskilled workers deteriorate in the course of globalization and that jobs of unskilled workers even disappear (e.g., Heine and Thakur, 2011, Stiglitz, 2002, Wood, 1995 and Wood, 1998).1 This skeptical view on globalization is held for two reasons: first, internationalization is supposed to increase competitive pressure. Firms, as a consequence, decrease wages, rationalize production processes, and demand more from their workers. Second, globalization is also believed to induce governments to deregulate labor markets to provide advantages to national and foreign investors. Governments may do so, for example, by reducing employment protection, unemployment benefits and minimum wages. More competition between firms and increasing trade liberalization is believed to induce a race to the bottom at the expense of workers, and labor market deregulation, in particular, is often held responsible for deteriorating working conditions and well-being of workers (e.g., OECD, 2004, Chapter 2; Häberli et al., 2012).

A widespread concern is that globalization negatively influences labor market performance and erodes labor market institutions. The first issue has been investigated in a large number of studies. My study deals with the second issue. Globalization and labor market institutions vary a great deal across countries. My study has explicitly focused on the cross-country variation. Employing the data on labor market freedom by the Fraser Institute (Gwartney et al., 2012) for about 140 countries, my results do not show that globalization induces labor market deregulation. To be sure, individual aspects of globalization may well influence labor market institutions and, in turn, employment and wages and globalization-induced effects may well differ across regions. There is, however, no reason to believe that working conditions of unskilled workers deteriorate. Scandinavian countries such as Norway and Sweden and countries in continental Europe are prime examples that rapidly proceeding globalization does not erode labor market institutions.