|
on Demographic Economics |
| By: | Folke, Olle (Uppsala University); Rickne, Johanna (Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)) |
| Abstract: | This paper addresses women's under-representation in top jobs in organizational hierarchies. We show that promotions to top jobs dramatically increase women's probability of divorce, but do not affect men's marriages. This effect is causally estimated for top jobs in the political sector, where close electoral results deliver exogenous variation in promotions across job candidates. Descriptive evidence from job promotions to the position of CEO shows that private sector promotions result in the same gender inequality in the risk of divorce. A description of male and female job candidates' household formations sheds some light on the mechanism behind this result. For most male candidates for top jobs, their promotion aligns with the gender-specialized division of paid and unpaid labor in their households. Many female candidates for top jobs live in dual-earner households and are married to older husbands who take a small share of parental leave. Divorce among women in top jobs occurs more often in couples with a larger age gap and a less equal division of leave, and in households in which her promotion shifts the division of earnings (further) away from the norm of male dominance. No divorce effect is found in couples that are more gender-equal in terms of having a smaller age gap and a more equal division of parental leave. We argue that norms and behavior in the marriage market hinder the closure of the gender gap in the labor market. |
| Keywords: | Promotions; Marriage; Social norms; Divorce; Career |
| JEL: | H00 J12 J16 |
| Date: | 2016–12–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1146&r=dem |
| By: | Riccardo Calcagno (EMLYON Business School and CeRP-Collegio Carlo Alberto); Flavia Coda Moscarola (CeRP-Collegio Carlo Alberto); Elsa Fornero (University of Turin and CeRP-Collegio Carlo Alberto) |
| Abstract: | Using a representative sample of Italian workers aged 55 and above, we study their preference for anticipated retirement and their willingness to pay for a year of anticipation after the recent Italian pension reform (2011), which significantly restricted the access conditions to retirement. We distinguish workers by gender and according to whether they have been obliged to postpone their exit by the reform. The preference for anticipated retirement is particularly strong for women and for workers who were directly affected by the reform. As for the “willingness to pay” to anticipate retirement, there is no systematic difference between the two categories, and this finding is common to both men and women. We also investigate whether informal care duties play a role in explaining the willingness to pay, and we find that the effect differs across genders. Women who are involved in informal care of children are willing to pay significantly more than women who are not caregivers and more than men. Our findings suggest that retirement policies produce side effects, which differ according to both gender and being a caregiver or not. These effects signal that when a pension system performs further tasks than the provision of retirement income, its reform may cause social mismatches unless supplemented by appropriate changes in other social programmes. |
| Date: | 2016–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crp:wpaper:161&r=dem |
| By: | Bailey, Roy E. (University of Essex); Hatton, Timothy J. (University of Essex); Inwood, Kris (University of Guelph) |
| Abstract: | Atmospheric pollution was an important side effect of coal-fired industrialisation in the nineteenth century. In Britain emissions of black smoke were on the order of fifty times as high as they were a century later. In this paper we examine the effects of these emissions on child development by analysing the heights on enlistment during the First World War of men born in England and Wales in the 1890s. We use the occupational structure to measure the coal intensity of the districts in which these men were observed as children in the 1901 census. We find strong negative effects of coal intensity on height, which amounts to difference of almost an inch between the most and least polluted localities. These results are robust to a variety of specification tests and they are consistent with the notion that the key channel of influence on height was via respiratory infection. The subsequent reduction of emissions from coal combustion is one factor contributing to the improvement in health (and the increase in height) during the twentieth century. |
| Keywords: | atmospheric pollution, health and height |
| JEL: | I15 N13 Q53 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10428&r=dem |
| By: | Biewen, Martin; Ungerer, Martin; Löffler, Max |
| Abstract: | We analyze the potential influence of a number of factors on the distribution of equivalized net incomes in Germany over the period 2005/2006 to 2010/11. While income inequality considerably increased in the years before 2005/2006, this trend was stopped after 2005/2006. Among many other factors, we consider the role of the employment boom and the development of inequality in wage incomes after 2005/2006. Our results suggest that, despite further increases in wage inequality, inequality in equivalized net incomes did not increase further after 2005/2006 because increased within-year employment opportunities compensated otherwise rising inequality in annual labour incomes. On the other hand, income inequality did not fall in a more marked way after 2005/2006 because also the middle and the upper part of the distribution benefitted from the employment boom. Other factors, such as changing household structures, population aging and changes in the tax and transfer system had no important effects on the distribution. Finally, we find little evidence that the distribution of equivalized net incomes was affected in any important way by the financial crisis and the subsequent great recession. |
| Keywords: | income inequality,poverty |
| JEL: | C14 D31 I30 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:zewdip:16088&r=dem |
| By: | Akee, Randall K. Q. (University of California, Los Angeles); Feir, Donna (University of Victoria) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we use confidential-use Census and administrative data to produce the first national estimates of excess mortality, institutionalization and homelessness for the largest Indigenous population in Canada from the ages of 5 to 64. We identify mortality rates at least twice the Canadian average and find exceptionally high mortality rates for young Indigenous women and girls – up to four times the Canadian average at certain ages. We show mortality rates are even higher on reserve – up to five times the Canadian average. These relative mortality rates are higher than the relative mortality rates of African Americans and the Native Americans to non-Hispanics in the United States. We also estimate very high rates of institutionalization and homelessness, especially among men and as a result there are stark gender ratio imbalances among this population. We speculate that this gender imbalance may play a role in excess female mortality in addition to several other socioeconomic factors. |
| Keywords: | mortality, First Nations, Native American, Status Indian, homelessness, institutionalization, gender bias |
| JEL: | J10 J15 J16 I15 I14 I32 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10416&r=dem |
| By: | Chletsos, Michael; Roupakias, Stelios |
| Abstract: | This study applies the skill-cell approach introduced by Borjas (2003) in order to identify the causal impact of immigration on the employment opportunities of resident workers, using data from two different samples, namely two waves of the Census of Population (1991 and 2001) and the Greek Labour Force Survey (1998-2015). Grouping workers in three education and eight experience classes at the national level, we find small adverse effects on the employment outcomes of natives, that are generally not sensitive to alternative education and experience classifications and when accounting for the effective experience of immigrants. However, as for the period between 1998 and 2015, our findings appear to be driven by the negative influence of immigration ascertained in the sub-period during the Great Recession. Remarkably, there is some evidence of complementarity when the pre-recession period (1998- 2007) is considered. The less-skilled natives, appear to be the group of workers which is more vulnerable to immigration. Our results also indicate that the Greek economy has the capacity to accommodate large immigration flows in the long-run, without significant effects. Finally, contrary to earlier studies, we do not find evidence consistent with the idea that migrants push natives towards complex, language-intensive tasks. |
| Keywords: | Immigration employment, earnings |
| JEL: | F22 J15 J31 |
| Date: | 2016–12–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:75659&r=dem |