Human Capital, Employment and Bargaining

This book examines theories of firm-level human capital investment with respect to topics in labor demand, macroeconomics (especially connected to unemployment), and firm-union bargaining. It covers a wide range of related policy issues, including the worksharing versus layoff debate, wage-tenure profiles, taxation and the choice between pure wages and profit sharing compensation, and the role of specific investment in the Japanese firm versus the traditional (United States) neoclassical firm.

This book examines human capital investment, employment and bargaining at the level of the firm. It attempts the first summary of results that incorporates both human capital investment and employment decisions within firm - union bargaining models, emphasising investment in teams, or groups, of workers. The authors also examine human capital in relation to labour demand as well as the delineation between neoclassical and coalitional firms. Further, they investigate connections between, on the one hand, turnover costs and firm-specific human capital and, on the other, unemployment. Labour market policy topics recur throughout the book and include the choice between pure wage and profit sharing remuneration systems, the issue of whether training should be subsidised by governments, worksharing versus layoff decisions, payroll tax incidence and the choice of compensation system as well as the role of human capital in influencing a firm's voluntary ex ante decision as to whether or not to bargain with an established union.