TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Budde, Julian
AU  - Dohmen, Thomas
AU  - Jäger, Simon
AU  - Trenkle, Simon
        TI  - Worker Representatives
        PY  - 2024/Jul/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 17152
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp17152
        AB  - We study the descriptive and substantive representation of workers through worker representatives, focusing on the selection of German works council representatives and their impact on worker outcomes. Becoming a professional representative leads to substantial wage gains for the elected, concentrated among blue-collar workers. Representatives are positively selected in terms of pre-election earnings and person fixed effects. They are more likely to have undergone vocational training, show greater interest in politics, and lean left politically compared to the employees they represent; blue-collar workers are close to proportionally represented among works councilors. Drawing on a retirement-IV strategy and event-study designs around council elections, we find that blue-collar representatives reduce involuntary separations, consistent with blue-collar workers placing stronger emphasis on job security.
        KW  - representation
KW  - works-councils
KW  - unions
KW  - blue-collar worker
        ER  -