Flaherty, Eoin and Ó Riain, Seán
(2019)
Labour’s declining share of national
income in Ireland and Denmark: the national
specificities of structural change.
Socio-Economic Review.
pp. 1-26.
ISSN 1475-1461
Abstract
The share of national income going to workers has decreased steadily across
Europe since the 1980s. This apparently uniform decrease in labour’s share conceals
differences amongst states however—in ‘liberal’ Ireland, this fall has been drastic,
while that of ‘social democratic’ Denmark has been moderate. This article presents a
parallel time series analysis of institutional and structural factors shaping labour’s
share in Ireland and Denmark. Our results show that factors common to the study of
variation in labour’s share operate in different ways in different countries, both in
magnitude and causal mechanism. We find that stressors such as global trade, foreign
investment and high-tech growth produce different effects in each location.
Equally, protections such as unionization, leftist cabinets and welfare spending display
contradictory effects in both locations. We conclude that ‘power resource’ models
of labour share should be supplemented with comparative approaches that
emphasize how institutionalized socio-political logics mediate returns to labour.
Item Type: |
Article
|
Keywords: |
labour share; national income; comparative; time series; power resources; Ireland;
Denmark; |
Academic Unit: |
Faculty of Social Sciences > Sociology |
Item ID: |
11990 |
Identification Number: |
https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwy047 |
Depositing User: |
Prof. Sean O Riain
|
Date Deposited: |
03 Dec 2019 14:18 |
Journal or Publication Title: |
Socio-Economic Review |
Publisher: |
Oxford University Press |
Refereed: |
Yes |
URI: |
|
Use Licence: |
This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available
here |
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