Original
How Do Strikes and Lockouts Affect Applications to Danish Public Service Professional Education Programs? A Synthetic Control Analysis
Abstract
ABSTRACT With fewer young people entering public service, public employers and the corresponding trade unions aim at signaling that they offer attractive working conditions. However, in the struggle for attractive conditions, labor market conflicts occur between public employers and public sector unions when bargains fail. According to signaling theory, such conflicts could serve as negative signals and thus decrease attraction to the profession. We investigate the signaling effects of two large‐scale labor market conflicts in Denmark, a nurse strike and a teacher lockout, on applications to the respective nursing and teacher education programs. For both conflicts, we employ a synthetic control design to estimate that each conflict resulted in 17%–23% fewer first‐priority applications. The findings suggest that labor market conflicts function as negative signals that decrease attraction to the given career and highlight that there are hidden costs to labor market conflicts for policymakers, public employers, and public sector unions.
中文
罢工与闭厂如何影响丹麦公共服务专业教育项目的申请？一项合成控制分析
摘要
随着进入公共服务领域的年轻人减少，公共部门雇主及相关工会旨在释放其提供有吸引力工作条件的信号。然而，在争取有吸引力条件的过程中，当谈判失败时，公共部门雇主与公共部门工会之间会发生劳动力市场冲突。根据信号理论，此类冲突可能作为负面信号，从而降低该职业的吸引力。我们考察丹麦两起大规模劳动力市场冲突——护士罢工与教师闭厂——对相应护理与教师教育项目申请的信号效应。针对这两起冲突，我们采用合成控制设计，估计每起冲突导致第一志愿申请减少17%–23%。研究结果表明，劳动力市场冲突会作为负面信号降低特定职业的吸引力，并凸显出劳动力市场冲突对政策制定者、公共部门雇主和公共部门工会而言存在隐性成本。
关键词
罢工、闭厂、公共服务、专业教育项目、合成控制、信号理论、劳动力市场冲突、公共部门工会