بررسی تعامل بین دستمزد بهره وری و اصطکاک های بازار کار

This paper explores the combined effects of efficiency wages and labor market matching frictions. A combined efficiency wage-frictional model is developed in which separate efficiency wage, frictional, and undistorted models are nested. It is found that the inclusion of efficiency wages puts upward pressure on wages and raises unemployment, while the friction puts downward pressure on wages and raises unemployment. Thus, it appears that unemployment generated by the frictional model cannot completely fulfill the role of unemployment as a discipline device, and vice versa. Other results show that the combined model has significantly different characteristics than its components.

In recent years, there has been intense interest in explaining the natural rate of unemployment. Two empirically supported models used to explain this phenomenon are efficiency wages and frictional matching.1 Because efficiency wages affect the productivity of workers and frictional matching affects the cost of labor, it is a natural exercise to explore the interaction between the two models. This paper builds a model in which the individual efficiency wage and frictional elements can be isolated, yet analysis reveals that the combined model exhibits characteristics that are fundamentally different from either model. For example a numerical simulation exhibits a situation in which unemployment and wages in the combined model exhibit more variability than either of the component models.

It is clear that a combined model exhibits markedly different characteristics than either a standard efficiency wage or frictional model. Not only do comparative static results differ, but the interaction of efficiency wages and costly matching itself can produce or eliminate unemployment. If, as evidence suggests, the real economy suffers from both efficiency wage and frictional distortions, there are important implications for theoretical, empirical, and, by extension, policy research. For example, a researcher using a frictional model to estimate the impact of the Internet reducing recruiting costs may overestimate the unemployment effects, while underestimating the effects on wages. A researcher attempting to determine the overall impact of efficiency wages on unemployment may over or underestimate the effects, depending on whether super or subadditivity is present. Similarly, a researcher attempting to isolate the level of frictional unemployment in an labor market may under or overestimate the true impact of frictional factors.