Stig Blomskog

Dimensions of the Wage-Unemployment Relationship in the Nordic Countries: Wage Flexibility Without Wage Curves

This paper analyses wage formation in the Nordic countries at the regional level by the use of micro-data. Our results deviate systematically from the main conclusions drawn by Blanchflower and Oswald (1994). We find no stable negative relation between wages and unemployment across regions in the Nordic labor markets once regional fixed effects are accounted for. Wage formation at the regional level is characterized by considerable persistence, but unemployment exerts no immediate influence on wages at the regional level. There is no evidence of a wage curve, nor of a Phillips curve, at the regional level in the Nordic countries. The results are consistent with a theoretical model where central bargaining agents determine a national wage increment, and local bargaining agents determine wage drift.

An Analysis of Permission Processes for Wind Power in Sweden

The expanding use ofwind power—an important sustainable and renewable energy resource—has given rise to value and interest conflicts, resulting in a complex and protracted permission process for establishing wind power stations. Existing academic analyses of these permission processes is performed in an informal everyday language, which may hamper the correct interpretation of various fundamental conceptual problems. This chapter reconstructs a typical permission process performed by Swedish authorities, following guidelines of the Swedish Environmental Code. It concludes that weighing decisions in permission processes seem to be based on conceptual mistakes due to the use of the notion of importance. These should be corrected by implementing a conceptual framework developed and applied in Multi-Criteria Decision Making.