|
on Demographic Economics |
|
Issue of 2018‒09‒24
six papers chosen by Héctor Pifarré i Arolas Max-Planck-Institut für demografische Forschung |
| By: | Bloom, David E. (Harvard University); McKenna, Matthew J. (Data for Decisions LCC); Prettner, Klaus (University of Hohenheim) |
| Abstract: | Globally, an estimated 734 million jobs will be required between 2010 and 2030 to accommodate recent and ongoing demographic shifts, account for plausible changes in labour force participation rates, and achieve target unemployment rates of at or below 4 percent for adults and at or below 8 percent for youth. The facts that i) most new jobs will be required in countries where "decent" jobs are less prevalent and ii) workers in many occupations are increasingly subject to risks of automation further compound the challenge of job creation, which is already quite sizable in historical perspective. Failure to create the jobs that are needed through 2030 would put currently operative social security systems under pressure and undermine efforts to guarantee the national social protection floors enshrined in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). |
| Keywords: | demography, unemployment, job creation, automation, digitalization |
| JEL: | J11 J20 J24 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11739&r=dem |
| By: | Ana Rute Cardoso; Louis-Philippe Morin |
| Abstract: | We investigate the potential channels that drive female labor force participation to rise in response to unbalanced sex ratios, in the presence of strong social norms against female employment. One such channel is women's desired labor supply, operating through the marriage market, and the other is employers' de mand for female labor. If faced with a reduction in male workforce, do employers turn to women to fill in the gap? Do women enter traditionally male occupations and industries, so that segregation decreases? Does the gender pay gap decline? We exploit exogenous variation in sex ratios across cohorts and regions, by using instruments based on casualties from the Portuguese Colonial War and massive emigration in the 1960s combined with its historical regional patterns. We find that as the sex ratio declined, female participation increased, women entered tra traditionally male-dominated occupations and industries, and the gender pay gap declined. These findings are consistent with a demand shock. Our estimated impact of sex ratios on marriage market points to a muted supply channel. We complement the quantitative analysis with an archival case. Our findings help to explain an apparent puzzle, a decades-long high female participation in Portugal, as opposed to the other Southern European countries. |
| Keywords: | Labor demand, labor force participation, gender segregation, pay gap |
| JEL: | J21 J23 N34 J22 |
| Date: | 2018–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1051&r=dem |
| By: | Bhalotra, Sonia R. (University of Essex); Clarke, Damian (Universidad de Santiago de Chile) |
| Abstract: | Twin births are often construed as a natural experiment in the social and natural sciences on the premise that the occurrence of twins is quasi-random. We present new population-level evidence that challenges this premise. Using individual data for 17 million births in 72 countries, we demonstrate that indicators of mother's health and health-related behaviours are systematically positively associated with the probability of a twin birth. The estimated associations are sizeable, evident in richer and poorer countries, evident even among women who do not use IVF, and hold for numerous different measures of health. We discuss potential mechanisms, showing evidence that favours selective miscarriage. Positive selection of women into twinning implies that estimates of impacts of fertility on parental investments and on women's labour supply that use twin births to instrument fertility will tend to be downward biased. This is pertinent given the emerging consensus that these relationships are weak. Our findings also potentially challenge the external validity of studies that rely upon twin differences. |
| Keywords: | parental investment, fertility, miscarriage, maternal health, twins, women's labor supply |
| JEL: | J12 J13 C13 D13 I12 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11742&r=dem |
| By: | Claudia Olivetti (Boston College and NBER); Barbara Petrongolo (Queen Mary University of London, CEPR and CEP (LSE)) |
| Abstract: | We draw lessons from existing work and our own analysis on the effects of parental leave and other interventions aimed at aiding families. The outcomes of interest are female employment, gender gaps in earnings and fertility. We begin with a discussion of the historical introduction of family policies ever since the end of the nineteenth century and then turn to the details regarding family policies currently in effect across high-income nations. We sketch a framework concerning the effects of family policy to motivate our country- and micro-level evidence on the impact of family policies on gender outcomes. Most estimates of the impact of parental leave entitlement on female labor market outcomes range from negligible to weakly positive. The verdict is far more positive for the beneficial impact of spending on early education and childcare. |
| Keywords: | Parental leave, Childcare, Family policies, Gender gaps |
| JEL: | J13 J16 J18 |
| Date: | 2017–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qmw:qmwecw:811&r=dem |
| By: | Niklas Engbom (Princeton University) |
| Abstract: | I assess the impact of an aging labor force on business dynamism, labor market fluidity and economic growth. The analysis embeds endogenous growth through creative destruction in an equilibrium job ladder model, highlighting feedback between the extent of mismatch in the labor market and incentives to innovate. I calibrate the model to aggregate reallocation rates and show that the theory replicates life cycle firm and worker dynamics in the data. The model implies that labor force aging over the last 30 years in the US explains 40-50 percent of the decline in job and worker reallocation and has reduced annual economic growth by 0.3 percentage points. Using cross-state variation and instrumenting for the incidence of aging using lagged age shares, I find additional empirical support for the prediction of large effects of aging on dynamism and growth. |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:red:sed018:1009&r=dem |
| By: | Chichilnisky, Graciela (Columbia University); Hammond, Peter J. (Dept. of Economics and CAGE, University of Warwick); Stern, Nicholas (LSE) |
| Abstract: | Ramsey famously pronounced that discounting "future enjoyments" would be ethically indefensible. Suppes enunciated an equity criterion implying that all individuals' welfare should be treated equally. By contrast, Arrow (1999a, b) accepted, perhaps rather reluctantly, the logical force of Koopmans' argument that no satisfactory preference ordering on a sufficiently unrestricted domain of infinite utility streams satisfies equal treatment. In this paper, we first derive an equitable utilitarian objective based on a version of the Vickrey-Harsanyi original position, extended to allow a variable and uncertain population with no finite bound. Following the work of Chichilnisky and others on sustainability, slightly weakening the conditions of Koopmans and co-authors allows intergenerational equity to be satis ed. In fact, assuming that the expected total number of individuals who ever live is nite, and that each individual's utility is bounded both above and below, there is a coherent equitable objective based on expected total utility. Moreover, it implies the \extinction discounting rule" advocated by, inter alia, the Stern Review on climate change. |
| Keywords: | Discount rate ; utilitarianism ; consequentialization ; Vickrey-Harsanyi original position ; Suppes criterion ; optimal population ; average versus total utility ; intergenerational equity ; long-run discounting ; sustainable preferences ; extinction discounting rule JEL Classification: D63 ; D70 ; D90 ; Q54 ; Q56 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:386&r=dem |