【Macro Seminar】Financing from Workers: Can Labor Market Power Mitigate Financial Frictions?
2026/03/03
研討會日期 : 2026-03-03
時間 : 14:30
主講人 : Professor Yan Bai
地點 : Conference Room B110
主持人 : Professor Wen-Tai Hsu
演講者簡介 : Professor Yan Bai received her Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Minnesota in 2005. She is currently a Professor at the University of Rochester and a Visiting Scholar at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research interests are International Economics and Macroeconomics.
演講摘要 : We show that firms with labor market power can partially offset financial distress by financing through reduced worker compensation. Using Census quarterly employer-employee data, we find that workers in highly leveraged firms experience significantly slower earnings growth following an unexpected disinflation shock that increases the real burden of firms' nominal debt. This response is stronger for firms with greater labor market power. Moreover, we find no evidence that these firms subsequently compensate workers with higher earnings, nor do worker separations increase, suggesting that workers remain despite relatively lower pay. Motivated by these findings, we develop a heterogeneous-firm model featuring both labor market power and default risk. When calibrated to U.S. firm financing patterns and job substitutability, the model shows that labor market power mitigates approximately one-third of the negative effects of financial distress.
