Bargaining power and job flows in the US

This work analyzes the relationship between job flows and bargaining power at the institutional level, where the latter is measured by unionization and labor policies, focusing on US labor market since 2000. Over this period, job flows indicators, namely hires, job openings, layoffs and quits from JOLTS dataset, displayed abrupt responses to recession: particularly, after the pandemic crisis all of them reached their maxima (the "Great Resignations"). Assessing labor power from a structural institutional point of view allows to detach from the traditional approach, based on the computation of quit elasticities at the individual level, that fails to explain the coincidence of low bargaining power and high turnover in low-wage industries. This study developed a two-ways panel analysis, where sectoral unionization dynamics are analyzed alongside industry fixed effects, while labor policies such as minimum wage and Right To Work laws are evaluated together with state fixed effects. The results include a high influence of macroeconomic and tightness conditions on job flows, as well as the relevance of sectoral and occupational dynamics. Furthermore, what emerges is a negative relationship between job flows and bargaining power at the institutional level.