Essays in Empirical Macroeconomics

This dissertation is comprised of two chapters in empirical macroeconomics. In Chapter 1, I study whether employer mergers cause harm to employee outcomes. Employer mergers within the same labor market increases market concentration, which has been argued to be associated with negative effect on worker wages. I find that in a sample of European mergers drawn from 21 countries, only mergers in the most concentrated markets decrease worker wages. Along with wage, however, employer productivity also declines. I further find that the extent of the negative effect depends on the strength of worker unions and collective wage setting. As expected, stronger unions mitigate the adverse effect of increased concentration on employee wages. Overall, the results suggest that employer consolidation does decrease wages especially where workers have the least collective power. However, whether this is a result of the abuse of employer's market power is uncertain, given the contemporaneous loss in employer productivity.

In Chapter 2, I analyze the effect of IMF's Covid support to developing and emerging economies. Using three distinct proxies of economic activity in the first two years of the pandemic, I find that the pandemic-related funding from the IMF supported economic recovery from the initial downturn. I also find that fiscal relief that supported immediate government spending for Covid response was probably an important mechanism. Overall, the preliminary evidence suggests that IMF financing helped lessen the negative effects of the pandemic on economic activity.