Competitive policies and equilibrium unemployment.

Summary This thesis contributes to the growing literature on the interaction between pro-competitive policies and employment. Deregulation policy is employment-enhancing whether the bargaining is collective or individual, whether capital is present or absent in the analysis, and whether competition is monopolistic or oligopolistic. This is because the deregulation of goods markets allows for a fall in prices, which is reflected in an increase in aggregate demand to which firms respond by increasing their production and thus their demand for employment. In the presence of capital, this policy has a positive effect on employment, which is all the more marked when negotiations are individual and the economy is initially uncompetitive. On the other hand, it results in greater employment gains when negotiations are collective and the economy is fairly competitive. This is due to the "hold-up" phenomenon, which is more important in the context of collective bargaining when firms face little competition. Furthermore, we show that the policy of deregulating the goods market has a more positive impact on employment when the financial and labor markets are themselves deregulated. Moreover, the decrease in employment at the micro level is counterbalanced at the macro level by the creation of jobs by new firms entering the market as a result of the pro-competitive policy. This model also allows us to explain the reluctance of low-wage workers in the face of deregulation policy.