On the Determinants of the Skill Premium in Wages

We study the determinants of the skill premium in a matching model where wages are set in bilateral meetings between workers and firms. As a novelty, disagreeing parties do not have to separate immediately, but they may opt to wait for competing agents to arrive. This waiting option is disproportionately valuable for high-skilled workers because they are better protected against competition. This gives rise to a wage schedule with increasing skill premia. The model can be seen to capture, e.g., the consequences of market decentralization, or deunionization, and it may help explain the observed Europe-U. S. differences in wage structure. (JEL: J 31, J 30, J 52)