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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Erten, Bilge (Northeastern University); Keskin, Pinar (Wellesley College) |
| Abstract: | We investigate the impact of female employment on intimate partner violence by exploiting the differential arrivals of Syrian refugees across Turkish provinces as an exogenous labor market shock. By employing a distance-based instrument, we find that refugee inflows caused a decline in female employment with no significant impact on male employment. This decline led to a reduction in intimate partner violence, without changes in partner characteristics, gender attitudes, co-residence patterns, or division of labor. Our results are consistent with instrumental theories of violence: a decline in female earning opportunities reduces the incentives of men to use violence for rent extraction. |
| Keywords: | refugees, forced migration, employment, intimate partner violence |
| JEL: | F22 J12 O15 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14066&r=all |
| By: | Cheng, Nora (National Taiwan University); Fan, Elliott (National Taiwan University); Wu, Tsong-Min (National Taiwan University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the sudden disappearance of foot-binding, a costly custom practiced for centuries in China and Taiwan prior to its demise. We estimate the numbers of women who unbound their feet in response to the rapid growth of the sugarcane cultivation in Taiwan in the early 20th century, growth which boosted the demand for female labor relative to male labor. Cross-township variations based upon multiple history datasets indicate that cane cultivation had a strong and robust effect on unbinding. The IV estimations utilizing cane railroads – lines built exclusively for cane transportation – support a causal interpretation of the estimated effect. This finding implies that a change in gender-specific labor productivity can help eliminate costly norms against women, and it also provides additional support for the argument that foot-binding was incentivized by economic motives. We also present evidence lending credit for the conventional hypothesis of foot-binding as a form of marriage competition. |
| Keywords: | foot-binding, social norms, gender roles, sugarcane |
| JEL: | J16 N35 Z13 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14076&r=all |
| By: | Sudha Narayanan (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research); Sharada Srinivasan (University of Guelph) |
| Abstract: | This paper presents an overview of the state of young women farmers in India as they navigate livelihoods in a sector that faces severe challenges. Discussions of young women farmers in India often get lost in those focused on women farmers more generally and of youth in agriculture, whereas they are a distinct analytical and empirical category who merit attention. Besides being discriminated against compared to male youth, young women farmers are further likely more disadvantaged than their older female counterparts (in addition to their male peers) in terms of access to productive resources and are relatively more constrained as economic actors, even though they tend to have more formal schooling and access to information. We argue that knowledge of their challenges and circumstance is vital for the visibility and recognition of young women farmers as well as for sound, inclusive policies to support them. This is especially relevant in a context where non-farm opportunities for young men outstrip those available for young women. Towards this end, we draw on existing data and review literature to map the participation and situation of young women in agriculture in India. |
| Keywords: | young women farmers, youth, agriculture, farming, gender, India |
| JEL: | Q19 J13 J16 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ind:igiwpp:2020-041&r=all |
| By: | Antonie, Luiza; Inwood, Kris; Minns, Chris; Summerfield, Fraser |
| Abstract: | This paper uses new linked full-count census data for Canada to document intergenerational occupational mobility from 1871 to1901. We find significant differences between Canadian regions and language groups, with linguistic minorities experiencing notably lower rates of intergenerational mobility. International comparisons place Canada midway between other economies in the Americas and the most mobile European societies. Decompositions of overall mobility show that the Canadian experience shared the New World feature of high mobility from manual occupations, but also the Old World feature of greater persistence in white collar jobs. |
| Keywords: | Canada; intergenerational mobility; social mobility; linkage |
| JEL: | J62 N31 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:108411&r=all |
| By: | Jetter, Michael (University of Western Australia); Stockley, Kieran (University of Western Australia) |
| Abstract: | Although the gender gap in entrepreneurs' success rates to secure funding is staggering, we know little about its causes. This is because observing both sides of investor-entrepreneur interactions (especially for unsuccessful pitches) is difficult in reality, and the associated extraordinary stakes complicate appropriate simulations in the laboratory. Using comprehensive data of 4,893 interactions from the popular US television show Shark Tank, we test whether gender match with entrepreneurs can explain investors' likelihood to extend funding offers. We find female investors are 30% more likely to engage with female (rather than male) entrepreneurs, while no systematic gender preferences emerge for male investors. This result is exclusive to entrepreneurs in non-male-dominated product categories but disappears in male-dominated products. Estimates are robust to the inclusion of a comprehensive set of control variables (such as asking valuation, investor-, and season-fixed effects) and a range of alternative specifications. These findings from a field setting with large, real-life stakes provide empirical support for the industry representation hypothesis regarding the gender gap in venture capital funding. While results should be interpreted with caution, our findings suggest increased numbers of women in key venture capital positions could facilitate access to funds for female entrepreneurs. Nevertheless, our setting is not suited to fully explore associated efficiency considerations. |
| Keywords: | gender interaction effects, gender differences, venture capital financing, field data, high stakes bargaining |
| JEL: | D91 G11 G24 G41 J16 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14069&r=all |
| By: | Sharada Srinivasan (University of Guelph); Sudha Narayanan (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research) |
| Abstract: | Despite the substantial body of work focused on women farmers in India, the generational aspects of women farmers are often under-researched. Young women farmers (YWF) often get lost in discussions of youth in agriculture or women farmers more generally. In this paper, we present four case studies of young women farmers and discuss qualitative material from interviews with 22 women farmers from the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Madhya Pradesh. Through detailed qualitative interviews, we map the trajectories of these women into farming and map the challenges they face in becoming and being farmers. The four case studies highlight several similarities and differences. While young women farmers in this study demonstrate that they take farming seriously, are knowledgeable and passionate about farming, they also face formidable constraints in accessing land and other resources, training, markets and so on and often lack agency and autonomy as farmers. Their experiences highlight the crucial role of family, social networks, community and state support in their efforts to become successful farmers. |
| Keywords: | young women farmers, youth, agriculture, farming, gender, India |
| JEL: | Q19 J13 J16 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ind:igiwpp:2020-042&r=all |
| By: | Dust, Scott B.; Liu, Haiyang; Wang, Siting; Reina, Christopher |
| Abstract: | Employee performance is commonly investigated as a static, one-time snapshot of prior employee behaviors. For the studies that do acknowledge that performance fluctuates over time, the timeframe decision is disconnected from theoretical underpinnings. To make this connection clearer, we draw on entrainment theory and investigate trajectories in motivation and performance across the five-day workweek. We hypothesize that both motivational control (i.e., staying on course and sustaining effort in pursuit of goals through the redirection of attention) and performance have a declining trajectory across the workweek. Drawing on self-determination theory, we also hypothesize that trait-based mindfulness (i.e., non-judgmental present moment attention and awareness) negatively relates to the downward trajectory in performance across the workweek via its effect on the trajectory of motivational control. Finally, we take a trait activation theory perspective, hypothesizing that mindfulness is relevant as an indirect influence on performance trajectories through motivational control trajectories only when job demands are high. We test our model using 151 full-time employees in a medical device company. We collected data from participants twice daily across the five-day workweek. We then use these daily scores to create between-person (e.g., person-centric) trajectories to investigate the proposed relationships. The hypotheses are generally supported. There is a downward trajectory of both motivational control and performance across the workweek. Further, job demands conditionally moderate the indirect effect of mindfulness on performance trajectories through motivational control trajectories. Theoretical and practical implications specific to dynamic motivation and performance, entrainment, and mindfulness literature are discussed. |
| Keywords: | Mindfulness; motivational control; motivational trajectory; job demands; entrainment theory |
| JEL: | R14 J01 |
| Date: | 2020–12–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:108445&r=all |
| By: | Colmer, Jonathan; Voorheis, John |
| Abstract: | Evidence shows that environmental quality shapes human capital at birth with long-run effects on health and welfare. Do these effects, in turn, affect the economic opportunities of future generations? Using newly linked survey and administrative data, providing more than 150 million parent-child links, we show that regulationinduced improvements in air quality that an individual experienced in the womb increase the likelihood that their children, the second generation, attend college 40-50 years later. Intergenerational transmission appears to arise from greater parental resources and investments, rather than heritable, biological channels. Our findings suggest that within-generation estimates of marginal damages substantially underestimate the total welfare effects of improving environmental quality and point to the empirical relevance of environmental quality as a contributor to economic opportunity in the United States. |
| Keywords: | air pollution; environmental regulation; social mobility; human capital |
| JEL: | H23 Q53 J00 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:108495&r=all |
| By: | Philippe Aghion; Antonin Bergeaud; John Van Reenen |
| Abstract: | Does regulation affect the pace and nature of innovation and if so, by how much? We build a tractable and quantifiable endogenous growth model with size-contingent regulations. We apply this to population administrative firm panel data from France, where many labor regulations apply to firms with 50 or more employees. Nonparametrically, we find that there is a sharp fall in the fraction of innovating firms just to the left of the regulatory threshold. Further, a dynamic analysis shows a sharp reduction in the firm’s innovation response to exogenous demand shocks for firms just below the regulatory threshold. We then quantitatively fit the parameters of the model to the data, finding that innovation at the macro level is about 5.4% lower due to the regulation, a 2.2% consumption equivalent welfare loss. Four-fifths of this loss is due to lower innovation intensity per firm rather than just a misallocation towards smaller firms and lower entry. We generalize the theory to allow for changes in the direction of R&D, and find that regulation’s negative effects only matter for incremental innovation (as measured by citations and text-based measures of novelty). A more regulated economy may have less innovation, but when firms do innovate they tend to “swing for the fence” with more radical (and labor saving) breakthroughs. |
| JEL: | J08 O33 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28381&r=all |
| By: | Sudha Narayanan (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research) |
| Abstract: | In India, as well as globally, agriculture faces an apparent generational problem, with youth reluctant to take up farming as an occupation. Yet there has been limited research in India using a generational lens to understand young people's trajectory in farming - their entry into and their continuation in farming. This study draws on in-depth qualitative interviews of a small sample of young men and women in farming communities in Madhya Pradesh. It focusses on young people's experiences in becoming and being farmers, privileging their own perspectives on the challenges they encounter in accessing land, knowledge and other resources and how they negotiate them. The study finds that contrary to popular perception and notwithstanding aspirations to move away from agriculture, several young farmers given a choice would rather engage in agriculture as a full-time activity and seek support to be able to do so. The study underscores the need to treat young farmers, both men and women, as a distinct analytical category from the perspective of policy making. |
| Keywords: | youth, agriculture, farming, gender, India |
| JEL: | Q19 J13 J16 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ind:igiwpp:2020-040&r=all |