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on Demographic Economics |
| By: | Ana Lucia Abeliansky (Department of Economics, Vienna University of Economics and Business); Klaus Prettner (Department of Economics, Vienna University of Economics and Business) |
| Abstract: | We analyze the effects of declining population growth on automation. Theoretical considerations imply that countries with lower population growth introduce automation technologies faster. We test the theoretical implication on panel data for 60 countries over the time span 1993-2013. Regression estimates support the theoretical implication, suggesting that a 1% increase in population growth is associated with an approximately 2% reduction in the growth rate of robot density. Our results are robust to the inclusion of standard control variables, different estimation methods, dynamic specifications, and changes with respect to the measurement of the stock of robots. |
| Keywords: | Automation, Industrial Robots, Demographic Change, Declining Fertility |
| JEL: | J11 O33 O40 |
| Date: | 2021–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwwuw:wuwp315&r= |
| By: | Hannah Illing; Johannes F. Schmieder; Simon Trenkle |
| Abstract: | Existing research has shown that job displacement leads to large and persistent earnings losses for men, but evidence for women is scarce. Using administrative data from Germany, we apply an event study design in combination with propensity score matching and a reweighting technique to directly compare men and women who are displaced from similar jobs and firms. Our results show that after a mass layoff, women’s earnings losses are about 35% higher than men’s, with the gap persisting five years after job displacement. This is partly explained by a higher propensity of women to take up part-time or marginal employment following job loss, but even full-time wage losses are almost 50% (or 5 percentage points) higher for women than for men. We then show that on the household level there is no evidence of an added worker effect, independent of the gender of the job loser. Finally, we document that parenthood magnifies the gender gap sharply: while fathers of young children have smaller earnings losses than men in general, mothers of young children have much larger earnings losses than other women. |
| JEL: | J0 J16 J3 J63 J64 J65 |
| Date: | 2021–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29251&r= |
| By: | Henning Hermes (NHH Bergen, FAIR & Department of Economics); Philipp Lergetporer (Technical University of Munich & ifo Institute at the University of Munich and CESifo); Frauke Peter (German Centre for Higher Education Research and Science Studies (DZHW) & DIW Berlin); Daniela Simon Wiederhold (KU EichstŠtt-Ingolstadt, Ingolstadt School of Management & ifo Institute Munich) |
| Abstract: | Children with lower socioeconomic status (SES) tend to benefit more from early child care, but are substantially less likely to be enrolled. We study whether reducing behavioral barriers in the application process increases enrollment in child care for lower-SES children. In our RCT in Germany with highly subsidized child care (n > 600), treated families receive application information and personal assistance for applications. For lower-SES families, the treatment increases child care application rates by 21 pp and enrollment rates by 16 pp. Higher-SES families are not affected by the treatment. Thus, alleviating behavioral barriers closes half of the SES gap in early child care enrollment. |
| Keywords: | Child care, early childhood, behavioral barriers, information, educational inequality, randomized controlled trial |
| JEL: | I21 J13 J18 J24 C93 |
| Date: | 2021–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aiw:wpaper:15&r= |
| By: | Sarah Flood; Joel F.S. McMurry; Aaron Sojourner; Matthew J. Wiswall |
| Abstract: | Using every major nationally-representative dataset on parental and non-parental care provided to children up to age 6, we quantify differences in American children’s care experiences by socioeconomic status (SES), proxied primarily with maternal education. Increasingly, higher-SES children spend less time with their parents and more time in the care of others. Non-parental care for high-SES children is more likely to be in childcare centers, where average quality is higher, and less likely to be provided by relatives where average quality is lower. Even within types of childcare, higher-SES children tend to receive care of higher measured quality and higher cost. Inequality is evident at home as well: measures of parental enrichment at home, from both self-reports and outside observers, are on average higher for higher-SES children. We also find that parental and non-parental quality is reinforcing: children who receive higher quality non-parental care also tend to receive higher quality parental care. Head Start, one of the largest government care subsidy programs for low-income households, reduces inequality in care provided, but it is mainly limited to older children and to the lowest income households. Our evidence is from the pre-COVID-19 period, and the latest year we examine is 2019. |
| JEL: | I24 J13 |
| Date: | 2021–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29249&r= |
| By: | Anne Case; Angus Deaton |
| Abstract: | Deaths of despair, morbidity and emotional distress continue to rise in the US. The increases are largely borne by those without a four-year college degree—the majority of American adults. For many less-educated Americans, the economy and society are no longer providing the basis for a good life. Concurrently, all-cause mortality in the US is diverging by education—falling for the college-educated and rising for those without a degree—something not seen in other rich countries. We review the rising prevalence of pain, despair, and suicide among Americans without a BA. Pain and despair created a baseline demand for opioids, but the escalation of addiction came from pharma and its political enablers. We examine “the politics of despair,” how less-educated people have abandoned and been abandoned by the Democratic Party. While healthier states once voted Republican in presidential elections, now the least-healthy states do. We review the evidence on whether or not deaths of despair have risen during the COVID pandemic. More broadly, excess mortality from COVID has not increased the ratio of all-cause mortality rates for those with and without a four-year degree, but has instead replicated the pre-existing mortality ratio. |
| JEL: | I0 J1 |
| Date: | 2021–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29241&r= |
| By: | Björn Brey |
| Abstract: | Did recent technological change, in the form of automation, affect immigration policy in the United States? I argue that as automation shifted employment from routine to manual occupations at the bottom end of the skill distribution, it increased competition between natives and immigrants, consequently leading to increased support for restricting low-skill immigration. I formalise this hypothesis theoretically in a partial equilibrium model with constant elasticity of substitution in which technology leads to employment polarization, and policy makers can vote on immigration legislation. I empirically evaluate these predictions by analysing voting on low-skill immigration bills in the House of Representatives during the period 1973-2014. First, I find evidence that policy makers who represent congressional districts with a higher share of manual employment are more likely to support restricting low-skill immigration. Second, I provide empirical evidence that representatives of districts which experienced more manual-biased technological change are more likely to support restricting low-skill immigration. Finally, I provide evidence that this did not affect trade policy, which is in line with automation having increased employment in occupations exposed to low-skill immigration, but not those exposed to international trade. |
| Keywords: | political economy, voting, immigration policy, technological change |
| JEL: | F22 J61 K37 O30 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9302&r= |