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on Human Capital and Human Resource Management |
| By: | Sunde, Uwe; Vischer, Thomas |
| Abstract: | This paper suggests that the weak empirical effect of human capital on growth in existing cross-country studies is partly the result of an inappropriate specification that does not account for the different channels through which human capital aspects growth. A systematic replication of earlier results from the literature shows that both, initial levels and changes in human capital, have positive growth effects, while in isolation, each channel often appears insignificant. Studies that do not account for both channels might underestimate the effect of human capital due to convergence in human capital, in particular when measuring human capital in log average years of schooling. This study therefore complements alternative explanations for the weak growth effects of human capital based on outlier observations and measurement issues. |
| Keywords: | Human Capital, Growth Regressions, Specification. |
| JEL: | O47 O11 O15 E24 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:usg:econwp:2011:31&r=hrm |
| By: | Blau, Francine D. (Cornell University); Kahn, Lawrence M. (Cornell University) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we use New Immigrant Survey data to investigate the impact of immigrant women's own labor supply prior to migrating and female labor supply in their source country to provide evidence on the role of human capital and culture in affecting their labor supply and wages in the United States. We find, as expected, that women who migrate from countries with relatively high levels of female labor supply work more in the United States. Moreover, most of this effect remains when we further control for each woman’s own labor supply prior to migrating, which itself also strongly affects labor supply in the United States. Importantly, we find a significantly negative interaction between pre-migration labor supply and source country female labor supply. We obtain broadly similar effects analyzing the determinants of hourly earnings among the employed in the United States, although the results are not always significant. These results suggest an important role for culture and norms in affecting immigrant women's labor supply, since the effect of source country female labor supply on immigrant women's US work hours is still strong even controlling for the immigrant’s own pre-migration labor supply. The negative interaction effects between previous work experience and source country female labor supply on women's US work hours and wages suggest that cultural capital and individual job-related human capital act as substitutes in affecting preparedness for work in the US. |
| Keywords: | gender, immigration, labor supply, human capital |
| JEL: | J16 J22 J24 J61 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5890&r=hrm |
| By: | Wallace, Michael T.; Jack, Claire G. |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates returns to education for a sample of farm operators in Northern Ireland. The analysis examines the relationship between education and on-farm and off-farm labour incomes. Human capital earnings functions are estimated to identify the marginal return to education measured as years of schooling as well as the qualification level attained. Extending to a structural model, the methodology controls for the endogeneity of education in the earnings function and potential selection bias associated with off-farm labour market participation. In off-farm employment, the analysis shows that returns to education are of the order of between 6% and 9% for each additional year of schooling. However, on-farm earnings were not found to be significantly related to years of education, although the analysis does identify a significant on-farm return to an agricultural qualification |
| Keywords: | Human Capital, Time Allocation and Labor Supply, Agricultural Labor Markets, Wage Level, Labor and Human Capital, J24, J22, J43, J31, |
| Date: | 2011–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aesc11:108786&r=hrm |
| By: | Francine D. Blau; Lawrence M. Kahn |
| Abstract: | In this paper we use New Immigrant Survey data to investigate the impact of immigrant women’s own labor supply prior to migrating and female labor supply in their source country to provide evidence on the role of human capital and culture in affecting their labor supply and wages in the United States. We find, as expected, that women who migrate from countries with relatively high levels of female labor supply work more in the United States. Moreover, most of this effect remains when we further control for each woman’s own labor supply prior to migrating, which itself also strongly affects labor supply in the United States. Importantly, we find a significantly negative interaction between pre-migration labor supply and source country female labor supply. We obtain broadly similar effects analyzing the determinants of hourly earnings among the employed in the United States, although the results are not always significant. These results suggest an important role for culture and norms in affecting immigrant women’s labor supply, since the effect of source country female labor supply on immigrant women’s US work hours is still strong even controlling for the immigrant’s own pre-migration labor supply. The negative interaction effects between previous work experience and source country female labor supply on women’s US work hours and wages suggest that cultural capital and individual job-related human capital act as substitutes in affecting preparedness for work in the US. |
| JEL: | J16 J22 J24 J61 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:17275&r=hrm |
| By: | Uschi Backes-Gellner (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich); Christian Rupietta (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich); Simone N. Tuor (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines spillover effects from education at the firm level, separating the effects for different levels and types of education and allowing for a curvilinear relationship. Modeling a Cobb-Douglas production function, we show that wages of tertiary-educated workers depend positively on the number of workers with an apprenticeship degree. These effects are the result of informational spillovers between differently educated workers. We estimate an aggregated Mincerian earnings equation using data from a large employer-employee survey and account for firm fixed effects as well as endogeneous workforce composition. Our results are highly significant and robust throughout our specifications and show that the number of workers with an apprenticeship degree has a positive impact on average wages of tertiary-educated workers but with a decreasing rate. |
| Keywords: | Education, Informational Spillovers, Wages |
| JEL: | I20 J24 J30 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iso:educat:0065&r=hrm |
| By: | A. Arrighetti; F.Landini; A. Lasagni |
| Abstract: | The positive impact of intangible assets on several measures of economic performance is well documented in the literature. Less clear is what leads firms to invest in intangible assets in the first place. The latter is particularly important since, at least for the Italian manufacturing sector, firms exhibit a very strong heterogeneity in their level of intangible asset investments. In line with the capability-based theory of the firm we argue that the firm’s propensity to invest in intangible assets can be explained by factors that are internal and specific to the firm. Making use of a rich dataset we test and provide support for our hypotheses. In particular we find that the propensity to invest in intangible assets increases with the firm’s size, human capital and organizational complexity and with the past level of intangible assets. This points toward the existence of a cumulative dynamics in the process of intangible assets accumulation that may account for most of the heterogeneity observed in the data. The paper adds to the previous literature in two ways: first it highlights the existence of a strong intra-industry heterogeneity in intangible assets investments; and second, it offers an explanation for such heterogeneity. |
| Keywords: | : intangible assets, human capital, firms heterogeneity, organizational complexity, complementarity, knowledge economy, organizational capabilities |
| JEL: | L21 L25 O32 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:par:dipeco:2011-ep02&r=hrm |
| By: | Leandro Elia; Edoardo Di Porto (Dipartimento di Economia e Statistica, Università della Calabria) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we study how undeclared work affects the wages of undeclared and declared workers and in particular the declared wage inequality. Using individual data on Italy in the years 2000-2004, we compute a cross and own labor demand elasticity for undeclared and declared work. We provide an identification strategy relying on Italian amnesty tax laws in 2002. Such laws have changed the shape of Italian undeclared sector causing a quick emersion of undeclared workers. Our results based on a set of 2SLS regressions suggest that undeclared work: 1) decreases declared wages, 2) adversely affects undeclared wages and 3) raises wage inequality in the declared sector. Undeclared work competes more with least skilled jobs, while do not affect high skilled jobs. We found complementarity between undeclared workers and medium skills jobs. As a consequence reducing undeclared work decreases wage inequality as well as it decreases the earnings in medium skill sectors. This result suggests that undertaking reducing undeclared labor-policy might encounter resistance because of welfare loss of the medium class of workers. |
| Keywords: | Elasticity of labor demand, Undeclared labor, Wage inequality |
| JEL: | H26 J23 J31 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:clb:wpaper:201108&r=hrm |
| By: | Ferdinand von Siemens (University of Amsterdam) |
| Abstract: | Empirical research suggests that - rather than improving incentives - exerting control can reduce workers' performance by eroding motivation. The present paper shows that intention-based reciprocity can cause such motivational crowding-out if individuals differ in their propensity for reciprocity and preferences are private information. Not being controlled might then be considered to be kind, because not everybody reciprocates not being controlled with high effort. This argument stands in contrast to existing theoretical wisdom on motivational crowding-out that is primarily based on signaling models. |
| Keywords: | extrinsic and intrinsic motivation; crowding-out; intention-based reciprocity |
| JEL: | A13 C70 D63 D82 L20 |
| Date: | 2011–08–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:uvatin:20110115&r=hrm |
| By: | Rana, Badar-ul-islam; Munir, Kashif |
| Abstract: | It is important to recognize workplace stress because workplace stressors badly affect people’s mental as well as physiological health. Some of the reasons of stress at workplace could be the inability to meet out the demands of the job, relationship with colleagues and to control subordinate staff. After starting one’s career the key stressors are related to work, environment and people. Stress is the reaction of body due to interaction with any stimulus in the environment. This study focuses on how workplace stressors effect the motivation of an employee and what it outcomes in term of employee performance. In this study, there are several variables relating to employee performance, motivation and job stresses, whose types of measurement are interval and simultaneously investigated the several variables through structural equation modeling (SEM). The result shows that role conflict, role ambiguity and performance pressure has positively effect the employee motivation and it leads to positively affect employee performance. This study indicates and highlights the intensity of those factors that are involved to create a stress environment in the organization. So this study is policy oriented to maintain a required level of stress in the organization. |
| Keywords: | Stress Management; Motivation; Employee Performance |
| JEL: | J08 |
| Date: | 2011–04–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:32729&r=hrm |
| By: | Cooper, David J. (Florida State University); Sutter, Matthias (University of Innsbruck) |
| Abstract: | Team success relies on assigning team members to the right tasks. We use controlled experiments to study how roles are assigned within teams and how this affects team performance. Subjects play the takeover game in pairs consisting of a buyer and a seller. Understanding optimal play is very demanding for buyers and trivial for sellers. Teams perform better when roles are assigned endogenously or teammates are allowed to chat about their decisions, but the interaction effect between endogenous role assignment and chat unexpectedly worsens team performance. We argue that ego depletion provides a likely explanation for this surprising result. |
| Keywords: | role selection in teams, team performance, takeover game, winner's curse, communication, experiment |
| JEL: | C91 C92 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5892&r=hrm |
| By: | Rosaz, Julie (University of Lyon 2); Villeval, Marie Claire (CNRS, GATE) |
| Abstract: | This paper presents the results of a laboratory experiment in which workers perform a real-effort task and supervisors report the workers’ performance to the experimenter. The report is non verifiable and determines the earnings of both the supervisor and the worker. We find that not all the supervisors, but at least one third of them bias their report. Both selfish black lies (increasing the supervisor's earnings while decreasing the worker's payoff) and Pareto white lies (increasing the earnings of both) according to Erat and Gneezy (2009)'s terminology are frequent. In contrast, spiteful black lies (decreasing the earnings of both) and altruistic white lies (increasing the earnings of workers but decreasing those of the supervisor) are almost non-existent. The supervisors' second-order beliefs and their decision to lie are highly correlated, suggesting that guilt aversion plays a role. |
| Keywords: | evaluation, lie-aversion, guilt aversion, self-image, deception, lies, experiments |
| JEL: | C91 D82 M52 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5884&r=hrm |
| By: | Tobias Boehm (Department of Economics, University of Muenster); Nadine Riedel (Centre for Business Taxation, University of Oxford) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates whether the institution of life time tenure for public sector employees affects the selection of workers into private and public sector occupation. Precisely, we argue that more generous employment protection for public sector employees may induce risk averse individuals to select into civil service employment even if they have a low intrinsic motivation and talent for this type of occupation. To empirically test for this effect, we exploit the natural experiment of the German reunification in 1990. While occupational choices in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) before 1990 may be affected by the described security motive, workers in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) enjoyed an employment guarantee irrespective of their occupation. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we employ a difference-in-difference approach that takes absenteeism as a proxy for intrinsic worker motivation and productivity. The results suggest a significant selection effect: public sector employees who made their occupational choice in the FRG report more days of absence than the control group of civil servants who chose their occupation in the former GDR. This effect turns out to be robust against controlling for potential socio-economic and cultural differences between the groups. |
| Keywords: | public sector, employment protection, occupational choice |
| JEL: | J45 J5 H8 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:btx:wpaper:1109&r=hrm |