Unions, innovation and investment: Australian evidence

Abstract

Machin and Wadhwani have produced evidence indicating that trade unions encourage investment in the UK. This paper uses comparable data to ascertain whether their rinding holds with respect to Australia. In general, and contrary to the UK study, the net effect of unions on investment in Australia is found to be negative. Nevertheless, investment levels at workplaces where unions were active were above the levels at non-union workplaces, offering support for the union-voice hypothesis which Machin and Wadhwani use to explain their results. © 1994 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. All rights reserved.