Documents Bengtsson, Erik 9 results

"Der Artikel stellt die gängige Ansicht infrage, dass starke Gewerkschaften und zentralisierte Lohnfindung die Lohnzurückhaltung fördern und diese in der Nachkriegszeit eine wichtige Ursache des starken Wirtschaftswachstums gewesen sei. Dem wird eine machtbezogene Perspektive gegenübergestellt, die starke Gewerkschaften als Treiber der Umverteilung vom Kapital zur Arbeit ansieht. Für Belgien, Deutschland und die Niederlande werden Daten zu Löhnen und Produktivität für den Zeitraum 1950 bis 2010 verwendet. Sie zeigen, dass es nach 1980 mehr Lohnzurückhaltung als zuvor gab; und es herrschte auch kein höheres Maß an Lohnzurückhaltung durch zentralisierte Lohnfindung. Die Ergebnisse bestätigen die machtbezogene Sicht auf die Akteure der Lohnfindung und lassen den Schluss zu, dass die Ursachen der Lohnzurückhaltung und ihre Auswirkungen auf Investitionen wie auf Ungleichheit neu zu überdenken sind."

"This article studies conflicts in the Swedish Labour Court that have occurred between trade unions and companies concerning the pay and working conditions for European Union migrant workers in Sweden during the period 2004–2010. During this period, unions and employers entered into disputes over: unions' rights in Sweden to be consulted when a company uses a subcontractor, the definition of an employee (the issue of ‘bogus self-employment'), the application of Swedish collective bargaining agreements to and for workers active in Sweden, how to determine wages for temporary staffing agency workers, and workers' rights to join a trade union. The article discusses the conflicts in the context of a widespread concern about ‘social dumping' in the European Union, and in the context of weakening trade unions and institutional change in labour markets. "

"The enlargement of the European Union in 2004 increased the flows of workers across national borders within the unions, making action against social dumping an increased priority for unions. Which factors influence unions' choices of strategies against wage dumping? Research has shown that in a cross-national perspective, unions with stronger institutional positions, defined as their influence on public policy and extent of collective bargaining coverage, have tended to be less interested in organising migrant workers than unions with weaker institutional positions. This article examines the choices made by three Swedish unions, all three with strong institutional positions, in responding to migrant workers: two have developed extensive organising responses, while the third relies on cooperation with employers and collective bargaining coverage to counteract social dumping. The article shows that intra-national variation can be explained by sectoral-based issues: that is, variation at both a country and sectoral level influences unions' strategic choices towards migrant workers. The article further highlights the transference of the Anglo-Saxon union revitalisation model in some sectors of the Swedish trade union movement, which faces increasing pressure as a result of labour precariousness in the Swedish labour market. "

"Wage restraint plays an important role in the conventional economic history explanation of the post-war golden growth experience of industrialized economies. Conversely, wage increases harming investment and increasing unemployment have been proffered as explanations for some of the high unemployment during the interwar period. This article argues that the conventional account implicitly only considers effects of wage growth on investment and not the advantageous effects on consumption. Thus, the evaluation of the effects on GDP growth is lop-sided. We employ a Post-Keynesian model to estimate effects of growth in the wage share of national income on consumption, investment, exports and imports separately, and weigh the effects together to estimate total effects on GDP growth, in Scandinavia (Denmark, Norway and Sweden) 1900–2010. Furthermore, we estimate the positive effects of wage pressure on productivity, showing it to be significant and positive in all three countries. We show that the postwar wage push had small positive effects on GDP growth in Denmark and Sweden, and a small negative effect in Norway. Thus, wage restraint is not a valid explanation for the postwar growth miracle. We propose a more comprehensive macroeconomic framework for understanding the implications of labour-capital distribution."

"The income distribution between capital and labour is understudied within industrial relations. This article investigates the relationship between union density, taken as an indicator of the bargaining power of unions, and the wage share of national income in 16 advanced capitalist economies since 1960. It is shown that overall there is a positive relationship between union density and the wage share, as one would expect. But the relationship is weak or non-existent in the Nordic countries, and in some specifications in Germany and Anglo- Saxon countries, and overall it is weak in the 1980s and early 1990s. The article discusses the differences between countries in relationship to the literature on corporatism and wage moderation, and the decreasing effect over time with reference to increased global competition and conservatism of monetary policy from about 1980 on, increasing unions' incentives for wage moderation policies. "

"We present the first comprehensive, long run salary information on Swedish middle-class employees before the twentieth century. Our data include school teachers, professors, clerks, policemen and janitors in Stockholm 1830–1935. We use the new data to compare the annual earnings of these middle-class employees with the annual earnings of farm workers and manufacturing workers. The results show that the income gap between the middle class and the working class widen drastically from the mid-nineteenth century to a historically high level during the 1880s and 1890s. The differentials then decreased during the first four decades of the twentieth century. The bulging earnings advantage of middle-class employees vis-à-vis unskilled workers chimes with Kocka's depiction of the latter half of the nineteenth century as the era of the bourgeoisie."