TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Garnero, Andrea
AU  - Kampelmann, Stephan
AU  - Rycx, François
        TI  - Minimum Wage Systems and Earnings Inequalities: Does Institutional Diversity Matter?
        PY  - 2014/Aug/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 8419
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp8419
        AB  - This paper explores how the diversity of minimum wage systems affects earnings inequalities within European countries. It relies on the combination of (a) harmonized micro-data from household surveys, (b) data on national statutory minimum wages and coverage rates, and (c) hand-collected information on minimum rates from more than 1,100 sectoral-level agreements across Europe. The analysis covers 18 countries over the period 2007-2009.
Empirical results confirm the intuition of many practitioners that the combination of sectoral minimum rates and high coverage of collective bargaining can, at least for earnings inequalities, be regarded as a functional equivalent to a binding statutory minimum wage at the national level. Regression results suggest indeed that both a national statutory minimum wage and, in countries with sectoral-level minima, a higher collective bargaining coverage are significantly associated with lower levels of (overall and inter-industry) wage inequalities and a smaller fraction of workers paid below prevailing minima. Several robustness checks confirm these findings.
        KW  - wage inequality
KW  - collective bargaining
KW  - minimum wage systems
KW  - Europe
        ER  -