nep-hrm New Economics Papers
on Human Capital and Human Resource Management
Issue of 2016‒05‒21
twelve papers chosen by
Patrick Kampkötter
Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen

  1. Who Gets Hired? The Importance of Finding an Open Slot By Edward P. Lazear; Kathryn L. Shaw; Christopher T. Stanton
  2. Rent-seeking, Government Size and Economic Growth By Wadho, Waqar Ahmed; Ayaz, Umair
  3. What You Don’t Know... Can’t Hurt You? A Field Experiment on Relative Performance Feedback in Higher Education By Ghazala Azmat; Manuel Bagues; Antonio Cabrales; Nagore Iriberri
  4. Management practices, workforce selection, and productivity By Bender, Stefan; Bloom, Nicholas; Card, David; van Reenen, John; Wolter, Stefanie
  5. Workplace perception and job-satisfaction of older workers By Raab, Roman
  6. A Life-Cycle Model of Trans-Atlantic Employment Experiences By Kitao, Sagiri; Ljungqvist, Lars; Sargent, Thomas J
  7. The geography of innovation in Italy, 1861-1913: evidence from patent data By Alessandro Nuvolari; Michelangelo Vasta
  8. Temporary Agency Work and the Great Recession By Baumgarten, Daniel; Kvasnicka, Michael
  9. Do minimum wages increase job satisfaction? : micro data evidence from the new German minimum wage By Bossler, Mario; Broszeit, Sandra
  10. Human Resources Mobilization; An Important Factor For Educational Management And Development By Eugenia Ameh; Indira Aernyi
  11. Are women in supervisory positions more discriminated against? A multinomial approach By Marco Biagetti; Sergio Scicchitano
  12. Effects of Incentive Amount and Type of Web Survey Response Rates By Jared Coopersmith; Lisa Klein Vogel; Timothy Bruursema; Kathleen Feeney

  1. By: Edward P. Lazear; Kathryn L. Shaw; Christopher T. Stanton
    Abstract: A model of hiring into posted job slots suggests hiring is based on comparative advantage: being hired depends not only on one’s own skill but also on the skills of other applicants. The model has numerous implications. First, bumping of applicants occurs when one job-seeker is slotted into a lower paying job by another applicant who is more skilled. Second, less able workers are more likely to be unemployed because they are bumped. Third, vacancies are higher for harder to fill skilled jobs. Fourth, some workers are over-qualified for their jobs whereas others are under-qualified. These implications are borne out using four different data sets.
    JEL: D83 J01 J2 J21 J23 J24 J6 J62 J64 M5 M51
    Date: 2016–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:22202&r=hrm
  2. By: Wadho, Waqar Ahmed; Ayaz, Umair
    Abstract: We explore the relationship between government size and economic growth in an endogenous growth model with human capital and unproductive social capital. We show that with endogenous discounting, growth outcome is history dependent and is function of initial endowment of human capital. With low endowment, government intervention of any size is growth depressing. With high endowment, government intervention is not associated with any depressing effect. For intermediate levels, there are multiple equilibria. Furthermore, countries with identical endowment and government size can be in different equilibrium, and can have different growth rates within same equilibrium if they differ in institutional quality.
    Keywords: Government size, Rent-seeking, Economic Growth, Human capital, Discounting
    JEL: D72 D90 H11 J24 O41 O43
    Date: 2015–02–22
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:71213&r=hrm
  3. By: Ghazala Azmat (Queen Mary University of London and Centre for Economic Performance, LSE); Manuel Bagues (Aalto University and IZA); Antonio Cabrales (University College London); Nagore Iriberri (University of the Basque CountryU PV/EHU, IKERBASQUE, Basque Foundation for Science)
    Abstract: This paper studies the effect of providing feedback to college students on their position in the grade distribution by using a randomized control experiment. This information was updated every six months during a three-year period. In the absence of treatment, students' underestimate their position in the grade distribution. The treatment significantly improves the students' self-assessment. We find that treated students experience a significant decrease in their educational performance, as measured by their accumulated GPA and number of exams passed, and a significant improvement in their self-reported satisfaction, as measured by survey responses obtained after information is provided but before students take their exams. Those effects, however, are short lived, as students catch up in subsequent periods. Moreover, the negative effect on performance is driven by those students who underestimate their position in the absence of feedback. Those students who overestimate initially their position, if anything, respond positively.
    Keywords: Relative performance feedback, Ranking, Randomized field experiment, School performance
    JEL: J71 J44
    Date: 2016–03
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qmw:qmwecw:wp788&r=hrm
  4. By: Bender, Stefan; Bloom, Nicholas; Card, David; van Reenen, John; Wolter, Stefanie (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany])
    Abstract: "Recent research suggests that much of the cross-firm variation in measured productivity is due to differences in use of advanced management practices. Many of these practices - including monitoring, goal setting, and the use of incentives - are mediated through employee decision-making and effort. To the extent that these practices are complementary with workers' skills, better-managed firms will tend to recruit higher-ability workers and adopt pay practices to retain these employees. We use a unique data set that combines detailed survey data on the management practices of German manufacturing establishments with longitudinal earnings records for their employees to study the relationship between productivity, management, worker ability, and pay. As documented by Bloom and Van Reenen (2007) there is a strong partial correlation between management practice scores and firm-level productivity in Germany. In our preferred TFP estimates only a small fraction of this correlation is explained by the higher human capital of the average employee at better-managed firms. A larger share (about 13%) is attributable to the human capital of the highestpaid workers, a group we interpret as representing the managers of the firm. And a similar amount is mediated through the pay premiums offered by better-managed firms. Looking at employee inflows and outflows, we confirm that better-managed firms systematically recruit and retain workers with higher average human capital. Overall, we conclude that workforce selection and positive pay premiums explain just under 30% of the measured impact of management practices on productivity in German manufacturing." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))
    JEL: L2 M2 O32 O33
    Date: 2016–04–28
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iab:iabdpa:201614&r=hrm
  5. By: Raab, Roman
    Abstract: This paper addresses the question to what extent workplace perception affects subjective well-being of older workers in their jobs. We use several dimensions of workplace perception in order to estimate their importance for job-satisfaction. Our results show that older workers' happiness in the job strongly depends on opportunities to develop new skills, receiving support in difficult situations, and recognition for their work. These dimensions of workplace attributes are merely psychological by nature; in contrast, salary opportunities and socio-demographic dimensions do not appear to have a strong impact on job-satisfaction, if at all.
    Keywords: Working Conditions - Job-satisfaction; Related Public Policy - Non-wage Labor Costs and Benefits
    JEL: J28 J32 J81
    Date: 2016
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:70917&r=hrm
  6. By: Kitao, Sagiri; Ljungqvist, Lars; Sargent, Thomas J
    Abstract: To understand trans-Atlantic employment experiences since World War II, we build an overlapping generations model with two types of workers (high school and college graduates) whose different skill acquisition technologies affect their career decisions. Search frictions affect short-run employment outcomes. The model focuses on labor supply responses near beginnings and ends of lives and on whether unemployment and early retirements are financed by personal savings or public benefit programs. Higher minimum wages in Europe explain why youth unemployment has risen more there than in the U.S. Turbulence, in the form of higher risks of human capital depreciation after involuntary job destructions, causes long-term unemployment in Europe, mostly among older workers, but leaves U.S. unemployment unaffected. The losses of skill interact with workers' subsequent decisions to invest in human capital in ways that generate the age-dependent increases in autocovariances of income shocks observed by Moffitt and Gottschalk (1995).
    Keywords: benefits; employment protection; Europe; minimum wage; U.S.; Unemployment
    JEL: E24 J21 J64
    Date: 2016–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11260&r=hrm
  7. By: Alessandro Nuvolari; Michelangelo Vasta
    Abstract: In this paper we provide a systematic appraisal of the spatial patterns of inventive activity in Italy in the period 1861-1913. Our main source of evidence is a data-set containing all patents granted in Italy in five benchmark years (1864-65, 1881, 1891, 1902, 1911). Our geographical unit of analysis is the province, an administrative district of the time. First, using some simple descriptive statistics, we introduce a characterization of the spatial distribution of patents and of its evolution over time. Second, we perform an econometric exercise in which we assess the connection between different forms of human capital and patent intensity. We are able to establish a robust correlation between literacy and “basic” patent intensity and robust correlation between secondary technical education and scientific and engineering studies and “high quality” patent intensity. Third, we study the connection between patents and industrialization. Our exercise shows that patents exerted a significant role in accounting for the level of industrial production. Interestingly enough, in this context, the role of patents was possibly more relevant than that of the availability of water-power and of the level of real wages (two factors that were pointed out by the previous literature, mostly on the basis of rather impressionistic accounts of the evidence). Our study warrants two main conclusions. First, domestic inventive activities were an important element of the industrialization process, even in a late-comer country such as Italy. Second, at the time of the unification, Northern provinces were characterized by more effective innovation systems. This factor contributes to explain the growing divide in economic performance between the North and the South of the country during the Liberal age
    Date: 2015–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:usi:wpaper:724&r=hrm
  8. By: Baumgarten, Daniel (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München); Kvasnicka, Michael (Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg)
    Abstract: We investigate with German data how the use of temporary agency work has helped establishments to manage the economic and financial crisis in 2008/09. We examine the (regular) workforce development, use of short-time work, and business performance of establishments that made differential use of temporary agency work prior to the crisis. Overall, our results suggest that establishments with a greater use of temporary agency work coped better with the sharp decline in demand and made less frequent use of government-sponsored short-time work schemes.
    Keywords: labour demand, employment adjustment, economic crisis, short-time work, temporary agency work, establishment data
    JEL: E32 J23 L23 J68
    Date: 2016–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9913&r=hrm
  9. By: Bossler, Mario (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]); Broszeit, Sandra (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany])
    Abstract: "On 1 January 2015 a new statutory minimum wage of EURO 8.50 per hour of work was introduced in Germany. Using a difference-in-differences approach, we estimate effects on worker-level outcomes of continuing employees. The results reveal a meaningful absolute increase in the affected workers' pay satisfaction. The increase in job satisfaction is modest and predominantly driven by changes in pay satisfaction implying only a small effect on all other dimensions of job satisfaction. Moreover, effects from the minimum wage on work engagement and turnover intention are virtually zero." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))
    Keywords: Mindestlohn, Zufriedenheit , Arbeitsmotivation, Arbeitnehmerkündigung
    JEL: J28 J38 J63
    Date: 2016–05–03
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iab:iabdpa:201615&r=hrm
  10. By: Eugenia Ameh (Doctoral Student - University of Agriculture, Makurdi); Indira Aernyi (Dept of Social Studies)
    Abstract: Personnel in educational institution are a strong resource for its development and valuable in the accomplishment of the organizational objectives. The productivity of an educational institution is strongly related to its people and strategies. Some of them identify with the school and are motivated in helping to reach goals, while others see the school as a vehicle meant to satisfy their own targets. The personnel of a school brings along a wide range of qualifications, abilities, and knowledge, which might not necessarily be beneficial to the school. This paper examines the value of motivation regarding the productivity of staff members
    Keywords: Human resources; Human resources management; Motivation; Educational development
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:3606412&r=hrm
  11. By: Marco Biagetti; Sergio Scicchitano
    Abstract: In this article we apply a two stage approach in order to investigate whether a stronger sex discrimination exists the higher the job position is. This analysis is carried out by separating the Italian labor market among supervisors and non supervisors. Once the selection terms are accounted for through a multinomial logit, amongst non supervisors both the wage gap and the discriminatory component rise, while amongst supervisors they considerably decrease and become not significant. Thus, the stronger negative process of selection amongst Italian female managers can lead to consider that segment of the labor market unfair.
    Keywords: gender wage gap, discrimination, sample selection, Italy, Oaxaca/Blinder decomposition
    JEL: J16 J31 J71 J24
    Date: 2016–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:itt:wpaper:2016-2&r=hrm
  12. By: Jared Coopersmith; Lisa Klein Vogel; Timothy Bruursema; Kathleen Feeney
    Abstract: Providing meaningful incentives demonstrates to respondents that researchers understand the competing demands on their time and value their input.
    Keywords: incentives, response rates, web surveys
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:439a67c5eb9946b98018bcf6a294cf48&r=hrm

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