What Labor Supply Elasticities Do Employers Face? Evidence From Field Experiments

We provide experimental evidence on the labor supply elasticity faced by employers, which is an essential measure of employer market power. We offered two different types of jobs, each with large randomized variations in pay, and observed the amount of work performed. We find no evidence of the strong employer market power suggested by prior research, with our elasticities close to unity. Furthermore, elasticities based on the total amount of work are significantly larger than if we use worker-level data as prior studies have done. Finally, elasticities differ by job type, suggesting that worker characteristics play a crucial role.