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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Rene Boeheim; Ana Rute Cardoso |
| Abstract: | Whereas there is widespread belief that workers in temporary help services (THS) are subject to poorer working conditions, in particular pay, than comparable workers in the rest of the economy, there is little evidence on whether that is driven by the sector per se or by the workers' characteristics. The first aim of this analysis is to quantify the wage penalty, if any, for workers in THS firms. Secondly, we analyze the wage profile of workers right before and after spells of THS. Linked employer-employee data for Portugal enable us to account for observable as well as unobservable worker quality. Our results show that workers in THS firms earn lower wages than their peers and that this difference is mostly due to the workers' characteristics. We estimate that workers in THS firms earn on average 9% less than comparable workers in the rest of the economy if we control for the workers' observable attributes only. This difference is reduced to about 1% when we control for unobservable characteristics as well. However, interesting differences emerge across groups. Younger workers, both men and women, earn higher wages in TAW than their peers in other firms, while the opposite holds for prime-age and older workers. Moreover, for young workers THS firms is not associated with a stigma effect that slows their wage progression after they work for THS, as opposed to prime-age and older workers, in particular males. Also before entering THS the wage trends are different. Prime-age and older workers, both male and female, see their wages deteriorate relative to their peers before entering THS, suggesting that adverse labor market conditions may motivate them to search for a THS job. On the contrary, for young workers we do not detect any pre-THS wage trend. |
| JEL: | D21 J31 J40 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13582&r=lab |
| By: | Mark Bils (University of Rochester and NBER); Yongsung Chang (University of Rochester and Seoul National University); Sun-Bin Kim (Department of Economics, Korea University) |
| Abstract: | We introduce worker differences in labor supply, reecting differences in skills and assets, into a model of separations, matching, and unemployment over the business cycle. Separating from employment when unemployment duration is long is particularly costly for workers with high labor supply. This provides a rich set of testable predictions across workers: those with higher labor supply, say due to lower assets, should display more procyclical wages and less countercyclical separations. Consequently, the model predicts that the pool of unemployed will sort toward workers with lower labor supply in a downturn. Because these workers generate lower rents to employers, this discourages vacancy creation and exacerbates the cyclicality of unemployment and unemployment durations. We examine wage cyclicality and employment separations over the past twenty years for workers in the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP).Wages are much more procyclical for workers who work more. This pattern is mirrored in separations; separations from employment are much less cyclical for those who work more. We do see for recessions a strong compositional shift among those unemployed toward workers who typically work less. |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0713&r=lab |
| By: | Robert Plasman (DULBEA, Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels); François Rycx (DULBEA, Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels); Ilan Tojerow (DULBEA, Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the role of worker and employer characteristics in the determination of wages in the Belgian private sector. Empirical findings, based on detailed matched employer-employee data covering the period 1995-2002, reveal the existence ceteris paribus of: i) a substantial but decreasing return on education, ii) a large and stable gender wage gap, iii) an increasing wage penalty for those employed on a fixed term contract, iv) a positive and persistent employer-size wage effect, v) small and slightly declining regional wage differentials, and vi) a positive but moderate effect of company collective agreements on workers’ wages. Further results show persistent but decreasing wage differentials between workers with the same observed characteristics and working conditions, employed in different sectors. |
| Keywords: | Wage structure, matched employer-employee data, Belgium. |
| JEL: | D31 J31 J41 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dul:wpaper:07-12rs&r=lab |
| By: | Claudia Goldin; Lawrence F. Katz |
| Abstract: | The U.S. wage structure evolved across the last century: narrowing from 1910 to 1950, fairly stable in the 1950s and 1960s, widening rapidly during the 1980s, and “polarizing†since the late 1980s. We document the spectacular rise of U.S. wage inequality after 1980 and place recent changes into a century-long historical perspective to understand the sources of change. The majority of the increase in wage inequality since 1980 can be accounted for by rising educational wage differentials, just as a substantial part of the decrease in wage inequality in the earlier era can be accounted for by decreasing educational wage differentials. <br><br>Although skill-biased technological change has generated rapid growth in the relative demand for more-educated workers for at least the past century, increases in the supply of skills, from rising educational attainment of the U.S. work force, more than kept pace for most of the twentieth century. Since 1980, however, a sharp decline in skill supply growth driven by a slowdown in the rise of educational attainment of successive U.S. born cohorts has been a major factor in the surge in educational wage differentials. Polarization set in during the late 1980s with employment shifts into high- and low-wage jobs at the expense of the middle leading to rapidly rising upper tail wage inequality but modestly falling lower tail wage inequality. |
| JEL: | J2 J24 J31 N32 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13568&r=lab |
| By: | Giovanna Aguilar (Universidad Católica del Perú); Sílvio Rendon (Stony Brook University and IZA) |
| Abstract: | Using a matched firm-worker dataset, we show both theoretically and empirically that positive assortative matching between firms and workers leads to an underestimation of the absolute value of wage elasticity of labor demand. |
| Keywords: | matching, employment, labor demand estimation |
| JEL: | J23 J32 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3076&r=lab |
| By: | Ellen R. McGrattan; Richard Rogerson |
| Abstract: | This paper describes trends in average weekly hours of market work per person and per family in the United States between 1950 and 2005. We disaggregate married couple households by skill level to determine if there is a pattern in the hours of work by wives and husbands conditional on either husband’s wages or on husband’s educational attainment. The wage measure of skill allows us to compare our findings to those of Juhn and Murphy (1997), who report on trends in family labor using a different data set. The educational measure of skill allows us to construct a longer time series. We find several interesting patterns. The married women with the largest increase in market hours are those with high-skilled husbands. When we compare households with different skill mixes, we also find dramatic differences in the time paths, with higher skill households having the largest increase in average hours over time. |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedmsr:397&r=lab |
| By: | John Gibson (University of Waikato) |
| Abstract: | In this note, propensity score matching (PSM) methods are applied to data from the 2005 International Social Survey Program Work Orientations (ISSP-WO) survey to examine the public sector pay premium in New Zealand. Taking account of a wide range of worker characteristics and attitudes, job attributes, and the effects that jobs have on workers and their family life, there appears to be a pay premium from working in the public sector of 17 to 21 percent. |
| Keywords: | compensating differentials; propensity score matching; public sector |
| JEL: | J31 |
| Date: | 2007–10–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:07/20&r=lab |
| By: | Kristjan-Olari Leping |
| Abstract: | The US black-white wage gap is an issue that has attracted thorough investigation, but so far the corresponding gap for fringe benefits has not received sufficient attention. Although ethnic differences in fringe benefits could affect wage differences, previous analysis of ethnic wage gaps in the vast majority of cases has not taken fringe benefits into account. In order to fill that gap in the existing literature, this article estimates the black-white gap for both wages and fringe benefits on the basis of US data. Data from the 2004 section of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 has been used in this analysis. Our results indicate that when controlling for various individual and job characteristics, there remains a wage gap in favour of whites, and for several fringe benefits, there is an unexplained gap in favour of blacks. This result means that the ethnic wage gap overestimates the ethnic compensation gap. We also argue that fringe benefits are used to compensate blacks for their lower wages. |
| Keywords: | ethnicity, wages, fringe benefits |
| JEL: | J15 J31 J33 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mtk:febawb:57&r=lab |
| By: | Rita Almeida (World Bank and IZA); Pedro Carneiro (University College London, IFS, cemmap and IZA) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the impact of an increase in the enforcement of labor regulations on unemployment and inequality, using city level data from Brazil. We find that stricter enforcement (affecting the payment of mandated benefits to formal workers) leads to: higher unemployment, less income inequality, a higher proportion of formal employment, and a lower formal wage premium. Our results are consistent with a model where stricter enforcement causes a contraction in labor demand in the formal sector; and where workers value mandated benefits highly, so that there is an increase in the formal sector labor supply, an increase in the willingness to become unemployed to search for a formal sector job, and a decrease in labor supply to the informal sector. |
| Keywords: | enforcement, labor regulations, inequality, unemployment, informal sector |
| JEL: | J23 J30 K31 D63 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3094&r=lab |
| By: | Bryan Engelhardt; Guillaume Rocheteau; Peter Rupert |
| Abstract: | This paper extends the Pissarides (2000) model of the labor market to include crime and punishment `a la Becker (1968). All workers, irrespective of their labor force status can commit crimes and the employment contract is determined optimally. The model is used to study, analytically and quantitatively, the effects of various labor market and crime policies. For instance, a more generous unemployment insurance system reduces the crime rate of the unemployed but its effect on the crime rate of the employed depends on job duration and jail sentences. When the model is calibrated to U.S. data, the overall effect on crime is positive but quantitatively small. Wage subsidies reduce unemployment and crime rates of employed and unemployed workers, and improve society’s welfare. Hiring subsidies reduce unemployment but they can raise the crime rate of employed workers. Crime policies (police technology and jail sentences) affect crime rates signifi cantly but have only negligible effects on the labor market. |
| Keywords: | Crime ; Unemployment ; Labor market |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedcwp:0715&r=lab |
| By: | Sara Connolly (University of East Anglia); Mary Gregory (University of Oxford and IZA) |
| Abstract: | Two particular features of the position of women in the British labour market are the extensive role of part-time work and the large part-time pay penalty. Part-time work features most prominently when women are in their 30s, the peak childcare years and, particularly for more educated women, a crucial period for career building. This makes it essential to understand its impact on women’s subsequent earnings trajectories. We find that the wage return to part-time experience is low - negligible in lower skill occupations. Even more important channels contributing to the pay disadvantage of women working part-time are job changing, particularly when this involves occupational downgrading. Downgrading can lead to a permanent pay disadvantage for women following a spell in part-time work. |
| Keywords: | female employment, part-time work, occupation, earnings trajectories, life-cycle, downgrade, over-qualification |
| JEL: | C23 C25 C33 C35 J16 J22 J62 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3101&r=lab |
| By: | Andrea Ichino (University of Bologna and IZA); Guido Schwerdt (Ifo Institute for Economic Research); Rudolf Winter-Ebmer (University of Linz, IHS Vienna and IZA); Josef Zweimüller (University of Zurich and IZA) |
| Abstract: | We use firm closure data from social security records for Austria 1978-1998 to investigate the effect of age on employment prospects. We rely on exact matching to compare workers displaced due to firm closure with similar non-displaced workers. We then use a differencein- difference strategy to analyze employment and earnings of older relative to prime-age workers in the displacement and non-displacement groups. Results suggest that immediately after plant closure the old have lower re-employment probabilities as compared to prime-age workers but later they catch up. While among the young the employment prospects of the displaced remain persistently different from those of the non-displaced, among the old the effect of displacement fades away, and actually disappears even immediately after plant closure when the effect of tenure based severance payment is controlled for. Our evidence suggests that increasing the retirement age does not necessarily produce individuals who are "too old to work but too young to retire" |
| Keywords: | aging, employability, plant closures, matching |
| JEL: | J14 J65 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3110&r=lab |
| By: | Jean-Pascal Guironnet; Magali Jaoul-Grammare |
| Abstract: | In the last two decades, France has experienced an increase in mismatches between education and work. This article studies twenty two years of French productivity to highlight the causes and effects of overeducation on the employee wages and the national income. From the INSEE and Cereq data, this analysis shows a positive effect in the short term on wages of the least qualified and overeducated worker. Furthermore, overeducation phenomenon does not penalize the higher graduates. Paradoxically, if it is always profitable for individuals to increase their education investment; in term of growth, overeducation of the higher graduates produce an unfavourable short term effect on GDP. |
| Date: | 2007–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lam:wpaper:07-03&r=lab |
| By: | Giorgio Brunello (University of Padova, CESifo and IZA); Margherita Fort (European University Institute and University of Padova); Guglielmo Weber (University of Padova, CEPR and IFS) |
| Abstract: | Using data from 12 European countries and the variation across countries and over time in the changes of minimum school leaving age, we study the effects of the quantity of education on the distribution of earnings. We find that compulsory school reforms significantly affect educational attainment, especially among individuals belonging to the lowest quantile of the distribution of ability. Contrary to previous findings in the relevant literature, we find that additional education reduces wage inequality below median income and increases it above median income. There is also evidence in our data that education and ability are complements in the production of human capital and earnings. While these results support an elitist education policy - more education to the brightest, they also suggest that investing in the less fortunate but bright could payoff both on efficiency and on equity grounds. |
| Keywords: | education reforms, distribution of earnings, Europe |
| JEL: | J24 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3102&r=lab |
| By: | Richard V. Burkhauser; Kosali I. Simon |
| Abstract: | Critics of pay or play mandates, borrowing from the large empirical minimum wage literature, provide evidence that they reduce employment. Borrowing from a smaller empirical minimum wage literature, we provide evidence that they also are a blunt instrument for funding health insurance for the working poor. The vast majority of those who benefit from pay or play mandates which require employers to either provide appropriate health insurance for their workers or pay a flat per hour tax to offset the cost of health care live in families with incomes twice the poverty line or more and, depending on how coverage is determined, the mandate will leave a significant share of the working poor ineligible for such benefits either because their hourly wage rate is too high or they work for smaller exempt firms. |
| JEL: | I18 I32 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13578&r=lab |
| By: | Ondřej Schneider (Institute of Economic Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic); Kamila Fialová (Institute of Economic Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic) |
| Abstract: | This paper focuses on the role of labour market institutions in explaining different labour market developments in European countries, with a special attention to the new European Union member countries. Labour market in these two parts of the EU witnessed diverging developments in the late 1990’s. While labour markets indicators generally improved in the “old” EU15, they were exposed to severe shocks in Central Europe. At the same time, Central European labour markets’ institutional background was changing and converging to the EU “standards”. This may allow us to analyse effects of various institutional setups and of their changes on major labour market indicators. We aim at complementing several studies from the late 1990’s by using more recent data that allow us to compare institutional setups from the mid 1990’s and early 2000’s both in “old” and “new” EU member states. We estimate effects of labour market institutions on various performance indicators (unemployment, long-term unemployment, employment, activity rate). While institutional arrangements played relatively minor role in both unemployment measures, they were much more powerful in explaining labour supply decisions. Our results confirm that high taxes and stricter employment protection increase unemployment and depress activity rate. We also show that active labour market policies seem to reduce unemployment and increase activity rate. Statistical tests further do not indicate that there is a difference in the institutional effects between “old” and “new” EU members. |
| Keywords: | labour market, unemployment, European Union, labour market institutions |
| JEL: | J48 J51 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fau:wpaper:wp2007_27&r=lab |
| By: | Rania Antonopoulos |
| Abstract: | There is now widespread recognition that in most countries, private-sector investment has not been able to absorb surplus labor. This is all the more the case for poor unskilled people. Public works programs and employment guarantee schemes in South Africa, India, and other countries provide jobs while creating public assets. In addition to physical infrastructure, an area that has immense potential to create much-needed jobs is that of social service delivery and social infrastructure. While unemployment and enforced “idleness” persist, existing time-use survey data reveal that people around the world—especially women and children—spend long hours performing unpaid work. This work includes not only household maintenance and care provisioning for family members and communities, but also time spent that helps fill public infrastructural gaps—for example, in the energy, health, and education sectors. This paper suggests that, by bringing together public job creation, on the one hand, and unpaid work, on the other, well-designed employment guarantee policies can promote job creation, gender equality, and pro-poor development. |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lev:wrkpap:wp_516&r=lab |
| By: | Sara Connolly (University of East Anglia); Mary Gregory (University of Oxford and IZA) |
| Abstract: | The UK’s Equal Opportunities Commission has recently drawn attention to the ‘hidden brain drain’ when women working part-time are employed in occupations below those for which they are qualified. These inferences were based on self-reporting. We give an objective and quantitative analysis of the nature of occupational change as women make the transition between full-time and part-time work. We construct an occupational classification which supports a ranking of occupations based on the average level of qualification of those employed there on a full-time basis. Using the NESPD and the BHPS for the period 1991- 2001 we show that perhaps one-quarter of women moving from full- to part-time work move to an occupation at a lower level of qualification. Over 20 percent of professional women downgrade, half of them moving to low-skill jobs; two-thirds of nurses leaving nursing become care assistants; women from managerial positions are particularly badly affected. Women remaining with their current employer are much less vulnerable to downgrading, and the availability of part-time opportunities within the occupation is far more important than the presence of a pre-school child in determining whether a woman moves to a lower-level occupation. These findings indicate a loss of economic efficiency through the underutilisation of the skills of many of the women who work part-time. |
| Keywords: | female employment, part-time work, occupation, life-cycle, downgrade, over-qualification |
| JEL: | C23 C25 C33 C35 J16 J22 J62 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3106&r=lab |
| By: | Stefanie Behncke (SIAW, University of St. Gallen); Markus Frölich (SIAW, University of St. Gallen, IFAU and IZA); Michael Lechner (SIAW, University of St. Gallen, CEPR, ZEW, PSI, IAB and IZA) |
| Abstract: | We evaluate a randomized experiment of a statistical support system developed to assist caseworkers in Swiss employment offices in choosing appropriate active labour market programmes for their unemployed clients. This statistical support system predicted the labour market outcome for each programme and thereby suggested an 'optimal' labour market programme for each unemployed person. The support system was piloted in several employment offices. In those pilot offices, half of the caseworkers used the system and the other half acted as control group. The allocation of the caseworkers to treatment and control group was random. The experiment was designed such that caseworkers retained full discretion about the choice of active labour market programmes, and the evaluation results showed that caseworkers largely ignored the statistical support system. This indicates that stronger incentives are needed for caseworkers to comply with statistical profiling and targeting systems. |
| Keywords: | profiling, active labour market programmes, ALMP, statistical treatment rules, unemployment, public employment services |
| JEL: | J68 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3085&r=lab |
| By: | Rachel Connelly (Bowdoin College); Jean Kimmel (Western Michigan University and IZA) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the effect of the timing of mothers’ daily work schedules on the amount of maternal caregiving she engages in on that same day. We look at total caregiving time on weekdays, early morning and evening caregiving time on weekdays, and total caregiving time on weekends. Since the timing of employment is, in part, a choice made by mothers, which is sometimes explicitly related to caregiving concerns, we argue that the decision to work nonstandard hours must be modeled jointly with its effect on caregiving time. Using an endogenous switching model, we examine the importance of demographic, spatial, and economic factors in mothers’ time choices distinctly by nonstandard work status. We find that the effect of additional children in the household has a larger effect on caregiving time for standard time workers than nonstandard workers, both weekdays and weekend. Especially important is the additional hours of evening care given by those with a young school-aged child if the mother works standard hours only, but no additional hours of evening care given by those with a young school-age child if the mother works any time after 6 pm. Being married reduces early morning and evening caregiving only if the mother is working in the early morning or the evening. In households with mothers working standard hours only, being married has no effect on mothers’ caregiving time. Finally, higher working mothers’ wages are associated with increased caregiving minutes both during the week and on the weekend only for those mothers who perform some of their paid employment during nonstandard hours. |
| Keywords: | time use, nonstandard work hours, caregiving |
| JEL: | J13 J22 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3093&r=lab |
| By: | Calvo, Esteban; Haverstick, Kelly; Sass, Steven |
| Abstract: | This study explores the factors that affect an individual’s happiness while transitioning into retirement. Recent studies highlight gradual retirement as an attractive option to older workers as they approach full retirement. However, it is not clear whether phasing or cold turkey makes for a happier retirement. Using longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study, this study explores what shapes the change in happiness between the last wave of full employment and the first wave of full retirement. Results suggest that what really matters is not the type of transition (gradual retirement or cold turkey), but whether people perceive the transition as chosen or forced. |
| Keywords: | happiness; retirement; gradual; phased; control; work; transition; psychological well-being; policy |
| JEL: | J26 I31 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5607&r=lab |
| By: | Eric D. Gould (Hebrew University and IZA); Eyal Winter (Hebrew University) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines how the effort choices of workers within the same firm interact with each other. In contrast to the existing literature, we show that workers can affect the productivity of their co-workers based on income maximization considerations, rather than relying on behavioral considerations such as peer pressure, social norms, and shame. Theoretically, we show that a worker’s effort has a positive effect on the effort of co-workers if they are complements in production, and a negative effect if they are substitutes. The theory is tested using panel data on the performance of baseball players from 1970 to 2003. The empirical analysis shows that a player’s batting average significantly increases with the batting performance of his peers, but decreases with the quality of the team’s pitching. Furthermore, a pitcher’s performance increases with the pitching quality of his teammates, but is unaffected by the batting output of the team. These results are inconsistent with behavioral explanations which predict that shirking by any kind of worker will increase shirking by all fellow workers. The results are consistent with the idea that the effort choices of workers interact in ways that are dependent on the technology of production. These findings are robust to controlling for individual fixed-effects, and to using changes in the composition of one’s co-workers in order to produce exogenous variation in the performance of one’s peers. |
| Keywords: | peer effects, team production, externalities |
| JEL: | J2 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3096&r=lab |
| By: | Francesca Francavilla (University of Florence); Gianna Claudia Giannelli (University of Florence, CHILD and IZA) |
| Abstract: | The paper deals with child labour in developing countries. We address a problem that has recently drawn much attention at the international level, that is, how to invest in women’s rights to advance the rights of both women and children. We study the problem from a new perspective. In our theoretical model we assume that the child’s time is an extension of her/his mother’s time, and that she has to decide how to allocate it. We estimate two empirical specifications, both multinomial logit. The first one, in line with the standard approach in the literature, estimates a model of the probability of the different child’s states, conditional on her/his mother’s states. The second empirical specification, in line with our theoretical model, estimates the mother-child states jointly. Using a unique, rich and representative data survey for all Indian states and for urban and rural India (NFHS-2, 1998/9), we select our sample drawing information from the household data set and the women’s data set. Our results show that the presence of the mother in the family increases children welfare, in terms of educational opportunities and protection from work activities. All our results indicate that the mother tends to stay home and send her children to school the better is the father’s employment position and the wealthier is the family. However, we observe a perverse effect. If the mother works, since female job quality and wage levels are very low, also her children have a higher probability to work. |
| Keywords: | child labour, education, women’s work, time allocation, India |
| JEL: | J13 J22 O15 O18 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3099&r=lab |
| By: | Stevans, Lonnie |
| Abstract: | The 1947 Taft-Hartley amendments to the National Labor Relations Act (1935) authorized a state's right to prohibit unions from requiring a worker to pay dues, even when the worker is covered by a collective bargaining agreement. Within a short time of the amendment's passage, twelve (12) states passed "right-to-work" laws, as did ten (10) more states in the intervening years. Although there has been considerable research on the influence of right-to-work laws on union density, organizing efforts, industrial development and some study of wage differences, there has been no examination of the legislations’ effect on business and economic conditions across states. In this paper, the average differences in business conditions, personal income, and employment across states that have enacted right-to-work laws versus those that do not have this legislation are examined using a Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA). Our most notable result is the finding that although right-to-work states may be more attractive to business, this does not necessarily translate into enhanced economic viability for all sectors in the right-to-work state. Not only are personal income and employment lower, but there are no significant differences in the number of firms and business formations between right-to-work and non-right-to-work states. |
| Keywords: | right-to-work laws; business formation; employment; Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) |
| JEL: | J51 C30 C50 K31 J58 |
| Date: | 2007–11–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5638&r=lab |
| By: | Calvo, Esteban |
| Abstract: | PURPOSE: This study addresses the impact of late-life paid work on physical and psychological well-being. METHODS: Longitudinal data was drawn from the Health and Retirement Survey and the RAND-HRS data base for more than 6,000 individuals aged 59 to 69 who were working or not-working in the year 2000 and were alive in 2002. Well-being was assessed by using a set of six measures including: self-rated health; self-rated memory; activities of daily living; instrumental activities of daily living and mood indicators. The study controls for previous well-being status in 1998 and for demographic and socioeconomic factors. RESULTS: Those who worked in 2000 tended to report greater well-being in 2002 than those who did not work in 2000, even after introducing rigorous controls (p<.01). Working in undesirable jobs changes the favorable effects of paid work on mood indicators and mortality. For those forced into retirement (20% of the sample), work is not an alternative. IMPLICATIONS: This study suggests that late-life work will help most people maintain their overall well-being. While working longer seems beneficial for most people, it will likely have negative consequences for some. The type of job seems to be a critical factor. Another critical factor is the opportunity to continue working. Older workers may be willing to prolong paid work, but, in order to find a job, they need to be able to work and have a real demand for their labor. Gerontologists and policymakers need to consider these factors when evaluating proposals to keep people in the labor force. |
| Keywords: | work; retirement; health; happiness; mortality; well-being; old age; policy; job satisfaction; control |
| JEL: | J21 I10 I12 J26 I31 J28 |
| Date: | 2006 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5606&r=lab |
| By: | Gould, Eric D; Kaplan, Todd |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the issue of whether workers learn productive skills from their co-workers, even if those skills are unethical. Specifically, we estimate whether Jose Canseco, one of the best baseball players in last few decades, affected the performance of his teammates. In his autobiography, Canseco claims that he improved the productivity of his teammates by introducing them to steroids. Using panel data on baseball players, we show that a player's performance increases significantly after they played with Jose Canseco. After checking 30 comparable players from the same era, we find that no other baseball player produced a similar effect. Clearly, Jose Canseco had an unusual influence on the productivity of his peers. These results are consistent with Canseco's controversial claims, and suggest that workers not only learn productive skills from their co-workers, but sometimes those skills may derive from unethical practices. These findings may be relevant to many workplaces where competitive pressures create incentives to adopt unethical means to boost productivity and profits. |
| Keywords: | corruption; crime; peer effects |
| JEL: | J24 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6550&r=lab |
| By: | Van Poeck Andrè; Veiner Maret; Plasmans Joseph |
| Date: | 2007–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ter:wpaper:0006&r=lab |
| By: | Michael Lechner (SIAW, University of St. Gallen, CEPR, ZEW, PSI, IAB and IZA); Stephan Wiehler (SIAW, University of St. Gallen) |
| Abstract: | This paper extends the traditional focus of active labor market policy evaluation from a static comparison of participation in a program versus nonparticipation (or participation in another program) to the evaluation of the effects of program sequences, i.e. multiple participation or timing of such programs. We use a dynamic evaluation framework that explicitly allows for dynamic selection into different stages of such sequences based on past intermediate outcomes to analyze multiple programs, the timing of programs, and the order of programs. The analysis is based on exceptionally comprehensive data on the Austrian labor force. Our findings suggest that (i) active job search programs are more effective after a qualification program compared to the reverse order, that (ii) multiple participations in qualification measures dominates single participation, and that (iii) the effectiveness of specific labor market programs deteriorates the later they start during an unemployment spell. |
| Keywords: | active labor market policy, matching estimation, program evaluation, panel data |
| JEL: | J68 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3092&r=lab |
| By: | Cristina Cattaneo (Cattaneo University (LIUC)) |
| Abstract: | The paper explores the determinants of internal migration in Albania, adopting a neoclassical approach to migration: an internal migration function is estimated using district wage and unemployment rate differentials. The aggregate level wages and unemployment, included in the migration equation, are retrieved from a first stage wage and unemployment equations, estimated controlling for personal characteristics. Moreover, in order to test the predictions of the human capital model of migration, the difference between migrants and non-migrants is emphasized in the estimation. The data source is the “Living Standard Measurement Survey for Albania” (2002), undertaken by the national Institute of Statistics and the World Bank jointly. The results reveal that both wage and unemployment differentials are important determinats of the propensity to migrate in Albania. This conclusion is further emphasized by noting that migrants gain substantially in terms of higher returns to individual characteristics after emigration. |
| Date: | 2006–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:liu:liucec:196&r=lab |
| By: | Jinyoung Kim (Department of Economics, Korea University); Sangjoon John Lee (Alfred University); Gerald Marschke (University at Albany and IZA) |
| Abstract: | It has long been recognized that worker wages and possibly productivity are higher in large firms. Moreover, at least since Schumpeter (1942) economists have been interested in the relative efficiency of large firms in the research and development enterprise. This paper uses longitudinal worker-firm-matched data to examine the relationship between the productivity of workers specifically engaged in innovation and firm size in the pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries. In both industries, we find that inventors?productivity increases with firm size. This result holds across different specifications and even after controlling for inventors?experience, education, the quality of other inventors in the firm, and other firm characteristics. We find evidence in the pharmaceutical industry that this is partly accounted for by differences between how large and small firms organize R&D activities. |
| Keywords: | Patents, Innovation, Labor productivity, Research, Firm size |
| JEL: | O30 O32 O34 J21 J24 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0708&r=lab |
| By: | Lopez-Pablos, Rodrigo A. |
| Abstract: | Exploring current literature which assess relations between cognitive ability and height, obesity, and its productivity-employability effect on women's labor market; we appraised the Argentine case to find these social-physical relations that involve anthropometric and traditional economic variables. Adapting an anthropometric Mincer approach by using probabilistic and censured econometric models which were developed for it. Have been found evidence that could be understood as existence of discriminative behavior on obese women to market entrance; besides, a good performance of women height as an unobserved approximation of cognitive ability measure to explain feminine productivity. |
| Keywords: | Height; Obesity; Anthropometric Mincer; Discrimination. |
| JEL: | I12 J24 C34 |
| Date: | 2007–08–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5532&r=lab |
| By: | Heinrich Hock (Department of Economics, Florida State University) |
| Abstract: | This paper considers the educational consequences of the increased ability of young women to delay childbearing as a result of the birth control pill. In order to identify the effects of the pill, I utilize quasi-experimental variation in U.S. state laws governing access to contraception among female adolescents during the 1960s and 1970s. Inference based on these laws indicates that unconstrained access to the pill increased female college enrollment rates by over 2 percentage points and reduced the dropout rate by over 5 percentage points. Further, early pill access led to a rise in college completion of approximately three quarters of a percentage point among women over the age of thirty. Finally, I analyze the outcomes of men in relation to the contraceptive laws, finding evidence that male educational opportunities also improved due to reductions in undesired early fertility among their female partners. |
| Keywords: | contraception, human capital, women, men |
| JEL: | I21 J13 N32 N42 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fsu:wpaper:wp2007_10_01&r=lab |
| By: | Kjell Erik Lommerud (University of Bergen); Odd Rune Straume (Universidade do Minho - NIPE) |
| Abstract: | We analyse how different labour market institutions — employment protection versus ‘flexicurity’ — affect technology adoption in unionised firms. The analysis is cast in a setting of corporate globalisation, where domestic unionised labour face the double threat of labour-saving technological innovations and international outsourcing of domestic production. In the main part of the analysis, we analyse trade unions’ incentives to oppose or endorse the adoption of new technology. Our main result is that both weaker employment protection and a higher reservation wage for unionsed workers (interpreted as increased ‘flexicurity’) contribute to making trade unions more willing to accept labour-saving technological change. Furthermore, these effects are reinforced by globalisation. In an extension to the main analysis, we endogenise the technological progress by studying firms’ incentives to invest in new technology and find that these incentives are also generally strengthened in a labour market with more ‘flexicurity’. |
| Keywords: | Technology adoption; Globalisation, Trade unions, Employment protection, Flexicurity |
| JEL: | F16 F23 J51 O33 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nip:nipewp:25/2007&r=lab |
| By: | Tim Callan (ESRI and IZA); Arthur van Soest (Tilburg University, RAND and IZA); John R. Walsh (ESRI) |
| Abstract: | How great an effect does the structure of income taxes have on women’s labour market participation? This issue is investigated using a discrete choice static labour supply model for married couples in Ireland. The model incorporates fixed costs of working and simultaneously explains participation decisions and preferred hours of work. Details of the tax system are fully incorporated, and key elements of the welfare system are also taken into account. The model is estimated using data from the 1994 wave of the Living in Ireland Survey. The results are used to analyse the labour supply effects of a move to greater independence in the tax treatment of couples. The influence of tax structure on participation is reconsidered in the light of trends in women’s participation in the labour market and two key changes in the structure of taxation: a shift from a joint or aggregated basis of assessment to an "incomesplitting" system in 1980 and a further substantial shift from income-splitting towards greater independence from 2000 onwards. |
| Keywords: | labour supply, discrete choice, micro-simulation |
| JEL: | H31 J22 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3090&r=lab |
| By: | Ariga, Kenn; Brunello, Giorgio; Iwahashi, Roki; Rocco, Lorenzo |
| Abstract: | In spite of their relative vicinity Scandinavian countries and Central European countries (mainly Germany) have substantially different schooling institutions. While the former group of countries delays school tracking until age 16, the latter group anticipates differentiation between age 10 and age 13. This paper proposes a simple median voter model of school design which accounts rather well for these differences. The key idea is that voters weight the potential advantages of early tracking in terms of higher wages and human capital against the information loss associated to early selection. |
| Keywords: | Central Europe; Scandinavia; school tracking |
| JEL: | I21 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6552&r=lab |
| By: | Avner Ben-Ner; Fanmin Kong; Stephanie Lluis |
| Abstract: | The task environment, characterized by the degree of complexity, variability, and routine of workers’ tasks, creates varying degrees of asymmetric information between workers and their supervisors, as well as poses varying degrees of difficulty for supervisors and workers in making correct decisions. Thus the task environment generates internal uncertainty, some of which is under the control of workers, in contrast with external uncertainty, which arises from the market and is beyond their control. The measures that address problems associated with internal uncertainty (including incentives, delegation of decision-making to workers, monitoring by supervisors and internal labor markets) are elements of organization design. We explore theoretically and empirically the relationship between uncertainty and organization design, expanding on Baker and Jorgensen’s (2003) idea that the risk-incentives relationship depends on the nature and sources of risk and Prendergast’s (2002a) idea that incentive pay is not a direct response to a firm’s task attributes but is part of a broader organization design that includes additional complementary and substitutable elements. |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hrr:papers:0107&r=lab |
| By: | Lindahl, Erica (Department of Economics, Uppsala University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the importance of gender and ethnic interactions among teachers and students for school performance in Swedish, English and Mathematics. School leaving certificates assigned by the teacher is compared with results on comprehensive national tests. The analysis is based on data on grade 9 students (age 16) from Sweden. I find that a student is likely to obtain better test scores in Mathematics, when the share of teachers of the same gender as the student increases. Correspondingly, ethnic minority students, on average, obtain better test scores in Mathematics, when the share of ethnic minority teachers increases. The positive same-gender effect on test scores is counteracted by a negative assessment effect. That is, conditional on test scores, same-gender teachers are less generous than opposite-gender teachers when assessing students’ performance. In Swedish and English no statistically significant effects are found. |
| Keywords: | School achievements; student and teacher interactions; gender; race |
| JEL: | I21 |
| Date: | 2007–10–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2007_025&r=lab |
| By: | Oliver Gürtler; Matthias Kräkel |
| Abstract: | We consider a double-sided moral hazard problem where each party can renege on the signed contract since there does not exist any verifi- able performance signal. It is shown that ex-post litigation can restore incentives of the agent. Moreover, when the litigation can be settled by the parties the pure threat of using the legal system may suffice to make the principal implement first-best effort. As is shown in the paper, this finding is rather robust. In particular, it holds for sit- uations where the agent is protected by limited liability, where the parties have different technologies in the litigation contest, or where the agent is risk averse. |
| Keywords: | double-sided moral hazard, efficiency wage, litigation contest, settlement |
| JEL: | D86 J33 K41 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bon:bonedp:bgse14_2007&r=lab |
| By: | Christian Dustmann (University College London, CReAM, CEP and IZA) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies parental investment in education and intergenerational earnings mobility for father-son pairs with native and foreign born fathers. We illustrate within a simple model that for immigrants, investment in their children is related to their return migration probability. In our empirical analysis, we include a measure for return probabilities, based on repeated information about migrants' return intentions. Our results suggest that educational investments in the son are positively associated with a higher probability of a permanent migration of the father. We also find that the son's permanent wages are positively associated with the probability of the father's permanent migration. Keywords: Intergenerational mobility, return intentions, educational investment, earnings. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational mobility, return intentions, educational investment, earnings |
| JEL: | J15 J24 J62 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3080&r=lab |
| By: | Robert A. Pollak (Washington University in St. Louis, NBER, CESifo and IZA) |
| Abstract: | Does joint taxation disadvantage women? To answer that question, this paper begins by reviewing unitary and bargaining models of intrafamily allocation, and then discusses the determinants of "bargaining power" in a world without taxes. It argues that wage rates rather than earnings are determinants of bargaining power, and then argues that productivity in household production is also a source of bargaining power. In the absence of human capital effects, joint taxation does not appear to disadvantage women in either divorce threat or separate spheres bargaining. Hence, the claim that joint taxation disadvantages women, if it is correct, depends on effects that operate through the incentives to accumulate human capital. But a satisfactory analysis of the effects of taxation on human capital awaits the further development of dynamic models of family bargaining. |
| Keywords: | joint taxation, family bargaining, household production |
| JEL: | H21 H24 D13 J22 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3109&r=lab |
| By: | Stevans, Lonnie |
| Abstract: | The advent of rising immigration has spurred research into a number of important issues insofar as the indigenous labor market is concerned. Some of these issues regarding the nature of the effect on native workers have been studied extensively. Others, like the interrelationships among immigration flows, African-American male earnings, employment, and incarceration rates have not been widely examined. In this paper, the association among these non-stationary variables is studied in the framework of a Vector Error Correction model and the associated cointegrating relationship. We find no statistically significant association among immigration, Black male employment rates, and Black male incarceration rates over the period 1962-2006, ceteris paribus. |
| Keywords: | immigration; Vector Error Correction; cointegration; incarceration rates; Black male employment rates |
| JEL: | J23 C32 J21 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5594&r=lab |
| By: | Wieland Muller (Department of Economics, New York University); Andrew Schotter (Department of Politics, New York University) |
| Abstract: | This paper reports the results of experiments designed to test the theory of the optimal composition of prizes in contests. We find that while in the aggregate the behavior of our subjects is consistent with that predicted by the theory, such aggregate results mask an unexpected compositional effect on the individual level. While theory predicts that subject efforts are continuous and increasing functions of ability, the actual efforts of our laboratory subjects bifurcate. Low ability workers drop out and exert little or no effort while high ability subjects try too hard. This discontinuity, which is masked by aggregation, has significant consequences for behavior in organizations. |
| Keywords: | Contests, All-Pay Auctions, Experiments |
| JEL: | C92 D44 J31 D72 D82 |
| Date: | 2007–01–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cso:wpaper:0022&r=lab |
| By: | Mohan, Ramesh; Kemegue, Francis; Sjuib, Fahlino |
| Abstract: | Most studies that use classical unit-root tests in OECD countries support the unemployment hysteresis hypothesis. However, similar classical tests performed on US data yield mixed results, uncovering specification issues. This study uses a number of panel unit root tests, which are known to overcome specification problems, to check the existence of hysteresis in unemployment data from three Massachusetts regions. The empirical results strongly reject a unit root in the unemployment rates, refuting the unemployment hysteresis hypothesis. |
| Keywords: | Hysteresis; Unemployment; panel unit root test |
| JEL: | C23 C22 J64 |
| Date: | 2007–11–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5580&r=lab |
| By: | Ottaviano, Gianmarco I P; Peri, Giovanni |
| Abstract: | In this paper we document a strong positive correlation of immigration flows with changes in average wages and average house rents for native residents across U.S. states. Instrumental variables estimates reveal that the correlations are compatible with a causal interpretation from immigration to wages and rents of natives. Separating the effects of immigrants on natives of different schooling levels we find positive effects on the wages and rents of highly educated and small effects on the wages (negative) and rents (positive) of less educated. We propose a model where natives and immigrants of three different education levels interact in production in a central district and live in the surrounding region. In equilibrium the inflow of immigrants has a positive productive effect on natives due to complementarieties in production as well as a positive competition effect on rents. The model calibrated and simulated with U.S.-states data matches most of the estimated effects of immigrants on wages and rents of natives in the period 1990-2005. This validation suggests the proposed model as a useful tool to evaluate the impacts of alternative immigration scenarios on U.S. wages and rents. |
| Keywords: | housing prices; immigration; rents; U.S. States; wages |
| JEL: | F22 J61 R23 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6551&r=lab |
| By: | David C. Maré (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Yun Liang (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines income and employment outcomes for 18 to 30 year old New Zealanders with post-school qualifications, using data from the 1996 and 2001 Censi. Outcomes are analysed by field of study, to highlight the variation in outcomes within the post-school graduate (PSG) population. Fields are characterised according to the specialisation of job choices made by PSGs. A preliminary investigation is undertaken of changes in supply and demand of PSGs in different fields. Part A of the report summarises patterns for all PSGs, and compares fields of study. Part B contains field profiles for each of 26 grouped fields of study that can be compared across the two years. |
| Keywords: | Labour Market outcomes, Tertiary Qualification, Young Graduates, New Zealand |
| JEL: | D31 |
| Date: | 2006–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mtu:wpaper:06_06&r=lab |
| By: | Louis-Philippe Morin (University of Ottawa and IZA) |
| Abstract: | The Local Average Treatment Effect (LATE) interpretation of the IV estimates of the returns to schooling is becoming increasingly popular. Typically, researchers reporting LATE estimates do not provide systematic evidence that there is substantial heterogeneity across different ability levels in returns, and without such evidence, the LATE interpretation is short of being compelling. The recent abolition of Grade 13 in Ontario’s secondary school system provides a unique opportunity to measure the benefits of an extra year of high school for high-ability students (those bound for college), rather than dropouts. I present a simple factor model which allows the value-added of Grade 13 (in terms of achievement) to be estimated, generalizing the standard difference-in-differences estimator to correct for heterogeneity in ability measurement across college subjects. The main finding is that the estimated return to an extra year of high school in terms of human capital is small for these high-ability students: students coming out of Grade 13 have a 2.2 point advantage (on a 100 point scale) over students from Grade 12, the estimated return to Grade 13 being around 2 percent. This evidence indicates that there is substantial heterogeneity in the return to an additional year of high school in the direction assumed in the prior literature. |
| Keywords: | return to schooling, factor model, difference-in-differences |
| JEL: | I20 I21 I28 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3098&r=lab |
| By: | Guy Standing |
| Abstract: | The growth of voluntary initiatives to promote socially responsible business practices has been accompanied by a chorus of criticisms, including claim that much of the activity has been public relations and attempt to deter governments from implementing effective regulations. This paper reviews various types of self-regulating initiative and campaigns that have grown up alongside to assess their effect on labour practices and employment. It concludes by proposing how there could be greater emphasis on market incentives coupled with more effective public measures to induce medium- and small-scale firms to improve their labour practices, including radical overhaul in labour inspectorates functions. |
| Keywords: | debt sustainability, emerging markets, crisis |
| JEL: | J5 J8 J81 J83 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:une:wpaper:62&r=lab |
| By: | Ruth Uwaifo Oyelere (Georgia Institute of Technology and IZA) |
| Abstract: | Differences in geopolitical regions of Nigeria are not debatable. However, there is no clear consensus on the dimension of these disparities. In this paper, claims of geopolitical region disparities in labor market outcomes are investigated using survey data from Nigeria between 1996-1999. Both descriptive and econometric analysis are used to test the null hypothesis that there are no significant regional differences in labor market outcomes in Nigeria. The results are surprising given the anecdotal evidence and general perception of disparities along this dimension. First, similar mean incomes across regions in Nigeria were noted. In addition, returns to education were not significantly different for Northern and Southern Nigeria. Given these findings, the null hypothesis cannot be rejected. There is no evidence of significant disparities in labor market outcome across geopolitical regions in Nigeria. |
| Keywords: | regional disparities, labor market outcomes, Nigeria, returns to education, inequality |
| JEL: | O5 I0 J70 O18 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3082&r=lab |
| By: | Simon Deakin; Colm McLaughlin |
| Abstract: | Legislation mandating equality of pay between women and men was among the earliest forms of sex discrimination legislation to be adopted in Britain. However, the model embodied in the Equal Pay Act 1970 is increasingly being questioned: the law is, at one and the same time, highly complex and difficult to apply, while apparently contributing little to the further narrowing of the pay gap. As a result there is a growing debate about whether a shift in regulatory strategy is needed, away from direct legal enforcement to a more flexible approach, based around the concept of 'reflexive law'. This paper provides an assessment of whether reflexive approaches are likely to work in the equal pay area. |
| Keywords: | equal pay, sex discrimination, reflexive law |
| JEL: | K31 J7 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cbr:cbrwps:wp350&r=lab |
| By: | Irma Clots-Figueras |
| Abstract: | This paper shows that the gender of politicians affects the educational levels of individuals who grow up in the districts where these politicians are elected. Increasing female political representation by 10 percentage points increases the probability that an individual attains primary education in urban areas by 6 percentage points, which is 21% of the difference in primary education attainment between the richest and the poorest Indian states. Caste also matters, as female politicians who won seats reserved for lower castes and disadvantaged tribes are those who mainly have an effect. In addition, both the gender and caste of politicians determine who benefits more from their policies: in urban areas female politicians increase educational achievements of those of their gender and caste. A unique dataset collected on politicians in India is matched with individual data by cohort and district of residence. The political data allow the identification of close elections between women and men, which yield quasi-experimental election outcomes used to estimate the causal effect of the gender of politicians. |
| Date: | 2007–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:werepe:we077342&r=lab |
| By: | Sonia Bhalotra (University of Bristol and IZA) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the impact of macroeconomic shocks on infant mortality in India and investigates likely mechanisms. A recent OECD-dominated literature shows that mortality at most ages is pro-cyclical but similar analyses for poorer countries are scarce, and both income risk and mortality risk are greater in poor countries. This paper uses individual data on infant mortality for about 150000 children born in 1970-1997, merged by birth-cohort with a state panel containing information on aggregate income. Identification rests upon comparing the effects of annual deviations in income from trend on the mortality risks of children born at different times to the same mother, conditional upon a number of state-time varying covariates including rainshocks. I cannot reject the null that income shocks have no effect on mortality in urban households, but I find that rural infant mortality is counter-cyclical, the elasticity being about -0.46. This is despite the possibility that relatively high risk women avert birth or suffer fetal loss in recessions. It seems related to the fact that women’s participation in the (informal) labour market increases in recessions, presumably, to compensate a decline in their husband’s wages. Consistent with this but, in contrast to results for richer countries, antenatal and postnatal health-care decline in recessions. These effects are reinforced by pro-cyclicality in state health and development expenditure. Another interesting finding that is informative about the underlying mechanisms is that the effect of aggregate income on rural mortality is driven by non-agricultural income. |
| Keywords: | infant mortality, income volatility, business cycles, India, health care, maternal labour supply, public expenditure |
| JEL: | I12 J10 O49 |
| Date: | 2007–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3086&r=lab |
| By: | Michal Paluch; Alois Kneip; Werner Hildenbrand |
| Abstract: | This paper deals with different concepts of income elasticities of demand for a heterogenous population and the relationship between individual and aggregate elasticities is analyzed. In general, the aggregate elasticity is not equal to the mean of individual elasticities. The difference depends on the heterogeneity of the population and is quantified by a covariance term. Sign and magnitude of this term are determined by an empirical analysis based on the U.K. Family Expenditure Survey. It is shown that the relevant quantities can be identified from cross-section data and, without imposing restrictive structural assumptions, can be estimated by nonparametric techniques. It turns out that the aggregate elasticity significantly overestimates the mean of individual elasticities for many commodity groups. |
| Keywords: | household demand, aggregation, heterogeneity, nonparametric methods |
| JEL: | D11 D12 C14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bon:bonedp:bgse13_2007&r=lab |
| By: | Michael Kvasnicka (Department of Economics, Humboldt University); Dirk Bethmann (Department of Economics, Korea University) |
| Abstract: | Based on county-level census data for the German state of Bavaria in 1939 and 1946, we use World War II as a natural experiment to study the effects of sex ratio changes on out-of-wedlock fertility. Our findings show that war-induced shortfalls of men to women significantly increased the nonmarital fertility ratio at mid century, a result that proves robust to the use of alternative sex ratio definitions, post-war measures of fertility, and estimation samples. The magnitude of this increase furthermore appears to depend on the future marriage market prospects that women at the time could expect to face in the not-too-distant future. We find the positive effect on the nonmarital fertility ratio of a decline in the sex ratio to be strongly attenuated by the magnitude of county-level shares of prisoners of war. Unlike military casualties and soldiers missing in action, prisoners of war had a sizeable positive probability of returning home from the war. Both current marriage market conditions, therefore, and foreseeable improvements in the future marriage market prospects of women appear to have influenced fertility behavior in the immediate aftermath of World War II. |
| Keywords: | World War II, Sex Ratios, Out-Of-Wedlock Births |
| JEL: | J12 J13 N34 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0730&r=lab |
| By: | Moniz, António |
| Abstract: | Most of the discussion and controversy on organisation of work concepts has been referenced to the manufacturing industry along the 20th century: it started with the concept of “scientific management” from Taylor, and continued with the new ideas on the importance of human factors as Mayo pointed out in the 1930s. Immediately after the 2nd World War Friedmann studied the human problems related to new manufacturing technologies and automation. And the late 1950 and 1960s were decades of strong debate on the socio-technics with the research at Tavistock Institute of London and the emergence of national programmes on new forms of work organisation. At the end of the last century the concept of collaborative work was developed together with the definition(s) of information systems and organisational design. However, the interest came from other production activities, like the services. This article analyses the approaches developed on these debates on the collaborative work and information system and its application to the manufacturing industry. |
| Keywords: | Collaborative Work; Information Systems; Manufacturing; |
| JEL: | O32 J50 O33 L60 Z13 |
| Date: | 2007–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5627&r=lab |
| By: | Carolyn Moehling; Anne Morrison Piehl |
| Abstract: | Research on crime in the late 20th century has consistently shown that immigrants have lower rates of involvement in criminal activity than natives. We find that a century ago immigrants may have been slightly more likely than natives to be involved in crime. In 1904 prison commitment rates for more serious crimes were quite similar by nativity for all ages except ages 18 and 19 when the commitment rate for immigrants was higher than for the native born. By 1930, immigrants were less likely than natives to be committed to prisons at all ages 20 and older. But this advantage disappears when one looks at commitments for violent offenses. <br><br>Aggregation bias and the absence of accurate population data meant that analysts at the time missed these important features of the immigrant-native incarceration comparison. The relative decline of the criminality of the foreign born reflected a growing gap between natives and immigrants at older ages, one that was driven by sharp increases in the commitment rates of the native born, while commitment rates for the foreign born were remarkably stable. |
| JEL: | J01 K4 N3 |
| Date: | 2007–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13576&r=lab |
| By: | Orazem, Peter; Glewwe, Paul; Patrinos, Harry |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews the stylized facts regarding the levels of human capital investments and the returns to those investments in developing countries. It shows that 23% of children in developing countries do not complete the fifth grade and of these, 55% started school but dropped out. We argue that eliminating dropouts is the most cost effective way to make progress on the goal of Universal Primary Education. Of the various mechanisms we can use, mechanisms that stimulate schooling demand have the strongest evidence of success to date and are the most cost effective. |
| Keywords: | Education, literacy, benefits, costs, developing countries, Universal Primary Education, collateral benefits |
| JEL: | O2 |
| Date: | 2007–11–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:12853&r=lab |
| By: | João Miguel Ejarque (University of Essex); Pedro Portugal (Bank of Portugal, Universidade Nova de Lisboa and IZA) |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates a structural model of the employment decision of the firm. Our establishment level data displays an extreme degree of rigidity in that employment levels are largely constant throughout our sample. This can be due to the fact that establishments face large shocks but also large adjustment costs, or alternatively that they incur no adjustment costs but that shocks are negligible. Given our identifying assumptions, we find that rigidity is due to adjustment costs and not to the shock process. We further find that these costs reduce the value of the firm as much as 5%. Finally, small fixed costs of adjustment have a large impact on entry and exit job flows. |
| Keywords: | adjustment costs, employment, rigidity |
| JEL: | C33 C41 E24 J23 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3091&r=lab |
| By: | Jinyoung Kim (Department of Economics, Korea University); Jungsoo Park (Department of Economics, Sogang University) |
| Abstract: | Workers who are educated abroad acquire human capital specific to the country of foreign study (for example, language capital and country-specific knowledge on firm organization and on social system) which makes them more productive than domestically educated workers when both types of workers are employed by subsidiaries of multinational firms headquartered in the country of foreign study. An increase in foreign-educated labor in an FDI-host country thus attracts more FDI from the country of foreign study. We find evidence from bilateral FDI and foreign-student data for 63 countries over the period of 1963-1998 that strongly supports this prediction. Our findings suggest that foreign-educated labor may account for a sizable portion of growth in FDI flows during the sample period. |
| Keywords: | foreign direct investment, multinational firm, human capital, foreign education, students abroad |
| JEL: | F21 F10 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0705&r=lab |
| By: | Myoung-jae Lee (Department of Economics, Korea University); Sang-jun Lee |
| Abstract: | The main difficulty in treatment effect analysis with matching is accounting for unobserved differences (i.e., selection problem) between the treatment and control groups, because matching assumes no such differences. The traditional way to tackle the difficulty has been ¡®control function¡¯ approaches with selection correction terms. This paper examines relatively new approaches: sensitivity analyses?sensitivity to unobservables?in Rosenbaum (1987), Gastwirth et al. (1998), and Lee (2004). These sensitivity analyses are applied to the data used in Lee and Lee (2005) to see how the assumption of no unobserved difference in matching affects the findings in Lee and Lee, to compare how the different sensitivity analyses perform, and to relate the ¡®sensitivity parameters¡¯ in the different sensitivity analyses to one another. We find (i) the conclusions in Lee and Lee are weakened in the sense that only the ¡®strong¡¯ ones survive, (ii) the sensitivity analysis in Rosenbaum (1987) is too conservative (and inferior to Gastwirth et al.¡¯s), and (iii) Gastwirth et al.¡¯s (1998) and Lee¡¯s (2004) approaches agree on some findings to be insensitive, but the two approaches also disagree on some other findings. We also look for ¡®comparable values¡¯ for the sensitivity parameters such that the resulting sensitivity findings are comparable across the different sensitivity analyses. |
| Keywords: | matching, sample selection, sensitivity analysis, job training |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0720&r=lab |
| By: | John T. Addison (QueenÕs University Belfast (U.K.) and GEMF, Portugal and The Rimini Centre for Economics Analysis, Italy.); Paulino Teixeira (Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal and GEMF, Portugal) |
| Abstract: | Using international data, we investigate whether the quality of industrial relations matters for the macro economy. We measure industrial relations inversely by strikes Ð which proxy we cross-check with an industrial relations reputation indicator Ð and our macro performance indicator is the unemployment rate. Independent of the role of other institutions, good industrial relations do seem to matter: greater strike volume is associated with higher unemployment. But these results apply in cross section. Holding country effects constant, the sign of the strikes coefficient is abruptly reversed. Although it does not seem to be the case that the line of causation runs from unemployment to strikes once we control for the endogeneity of strikes, it is also the case that support for the strikes proxy for industrial relations quality is much eroded. |
| Keywords: | strikes, industrial relations quality, unemployment, labor market institutions, cross-country data |
| JEL: | E24 J5 J64 |
| Date: | 2007–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rim:rimwps:28-07&r=lab |