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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Juan A. Lacomba (Universidad de Granada); Francisco M. Lagos (Universidad de Granada) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the role that low-skilled immigrant labor force plays in determining the benefits of the public pension of the host population. With an overlapping-generations model in continuous time which allows to identify which groups of native population are better or worse off with immigration and a fully redistributive pension system, we find that the retirement benefits and hence the welfare levels of the host population are affected in a different way whether sharing or not pension benefits with immigrants. In this sense, the youngest local population may prefer, contrary to the oldest ones, a policy of closed borders. |
| Keywords: | Immigration, welfare, pension benefits. |
| Date: | 2004 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cea:doctra:e2004_77&r=lab |
| By: | Lans Bovenberg; Thijs Knaap |
| Abstract: | This paper attempts to paint a coherent picture of the effects of ageing on a small, open, economy with large pension funds in different institutional settings. Quantitative scenarios are projected with an applied computable general equilibrium model with institutional details. We find that ageing leads to a tighter labor market, increasing costs for both pension funds and the government, and leaving the economy vulnerable to financial and further demographic shocks. We show that defined benefit pension arrangements can be destabilizing, but less so if an average-wage variable-indexation contract is chosen. Government can help by adopting a policy of tax smoothing, but the single most important determinant of the net burden of ageing is the eventual size of the increase in labor market participation of older workers. The intergenerational welfare effects of demographic shocks and changes in international interest rates are sizable and should be an integral part of the assessment of different policy instruments. |
| Keywords: | ageing, funded pensions, applied general equilibrium models, the Netherlands |
| JEL: | E17 H30 J18 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1403&r=lab |
| By: | Michele Boldrin; Maria Cristina De Nardi; Larry E. Jones |
| Date: | 2005–02–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cla:levrem:666156000000000506&r=lab |
| By: | Ours, Jan C. van; Veenman,Justus (Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | For immigrants who arrive in a country at a young age it is easier to assimilate than for teenagers. This paper investigates up to what immigration age the educational attainment of young immigrants in the Netherlands is similar to the educational attainment of secondgeneration immigrants, who were born in the country having at least one immigrant parent. It appears that this borderline immigration age depends on gender and country of origin. |
| JEL: | J15 J61 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:kubcen:200511&r=lab |
| By: | Ours,Jan C. van (Tilburg University, Center Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a dataset collected among inhabitants of Amsterdam, to study whether wages of prime age male workers are affected by the use of cannabis and cocaine. The analysis shows that cocaine use and infrequent cannabis use do not affect wages. Frequent cannabis use has a negative wage effect. The age of onset is also important. The earlier current cannabis users have started to use cannabis the larger the negative impact on their wage. |
| JEL: | C41 D12 I19 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:kubcen:200514&r=lab |
| By: | Ours,Jan C. van (Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a dataset collected among inhabitants of Amsterdam, to study the employment effects of the use of cannabis and cocaine. For females no negative effects of drug use on the employment rate are found. For males there is a negative correlation between past cannabis and cocaine use and employment. However, after correcting for the effect of unobserved personal characteristics there is no negative effect of cannabis use or cocaine use on the employment status of males. |
| JEL: | C41 D12 I19 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:kubcen:200515&r=lab |
| By: | Bacolod, Marigee; Tobias, Justin |
| Abstract: | A broad literature seeks to assess the importance of schools, proxies for school quality, and family background on children's achievement growth using the education production function. Using rich data from the Philippines, we introduce and estimate a model that imposes little structure on the relationship between intake achievement and follow-up achievement and evaluate school performance based on this estimated relationship. Our methods nest typical value added specifications that use test score gains as the outcome variable and models assuming linearity in the relationship between intake and follow-up scores. We find evidence against the use of value-added models for our data and show that such models give very different assessments of school performance in the Philippines. Using a variety of tests we find that schools matter in the production of student achievement, though variation in performance across schools only explain about 6 percent of the total (conditional) variation in follow-up achievement. Schools providing basic facilities - in particular schools providing electricity - are found to perform much better in the production of achievement growth. |
| Date: | 2005–02–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:12249&r=lab |
| By: | Newell, Andrew (University of Sussex and IZA Bonn); Socha, Mieczyslaw W. (University of Warsaw) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses the changes in the size distribution of wages in Poland over a decade of transition. Until about 1998 there were some forces tending to increase wage inequality and other forces contracting it. The result was a relatively constant level of inequality. Privatisation was the main force tending to increase wage inequality, partly because it generated major increases in the relative wages of professional and managerial workers. We demonstrate how private firms tend to pay less at the bottom end of the wage distribution and more at the top end. The main force contracting the variance of wages was the decline, between 1992 and 1998 in labour market participation of those with low levels of education. Wage inequality seems to have increased since 2000. Suggestively, whereas privatisation has continued, the decline in participation has halted. |
| Keywords: | wages, Poland |
| JEL: | J31 P23 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1485&r=lab |
| By: | Jousten, Alain (Université de Liège, CEPR and IZA Bonn); Lefèbvre, Mathieu (Université de Liège); Perelman, Sergio (Université de Liège); Pestieau, Pierre (Université de Liège, CEPR and DELTA) |
| Abstract: | The paper analyzes the link between old-age income programs and economic outcomes in Belgium. We use a simulation methodology to construct an average pension generosity variable. Our regression analysis explores the link with distributional outcomes in income, consumption and more subjective indicators. Results document the weak link between average generosity and distributional outcomes across a heterogeneous population. |
| Keywords: | pensions, inequality, social security, elderly |
| JEL: | H31 H55 I31 I32 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1486&r=lab |
| By: | Clark, Andrew (PSE and IZA Bonn); Postel-Vinay, Fabien (PSE, CREST-INSEE, CEPR and IZA Bonn) |
| Abstract: | We construct indicators of the perception of job security for various types of jobs in 12 European countries using individual data from the European Community Household Panel (ECHP). We then consider the relation between reported job security and OECD summary measures of Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) strictness on one hand, and Unemployment Insurance Benefit (UIB) generosity on the other. We find that, after controlling for selection into job types, workers feel most secure in permanent public sector jobs, least secure in temporary jobs, with permanent private sector jobs occupying an intermediate position. We also find that perceived job security in both permanent private and temporary jobs is positively correlated with UIB generosity, while the relationship with EPL strictness is negative: workers feel less secure in countries where jobs are more protected. These correlations are absent for permanent public jobs, suggesting that such jobs are perceived to be by and large insulated from labor market fluctuations. |
| Keywords: | perceived job security, Employment Protection Legislation, Unemployment Insurance Benefits |
| JEL: | J28 J65 I31 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1489&r=lab |
| By: | Giorgio BRUNELLO; Daniele CHECCHI |
| Abstract: | School vouchers introduced recently in some Italian regions have lowered the cost of private schools. On one side, we provide evid ence that Italian private schools may be selected for different r easons than quality considerations. On the other side, by exploit ing individual data on voucher applicants, we present evidence th at the percentage of voucher applicants is higher the higher the average quality of private schools, which we explain with the fac t that better quality schools provide better services to students , including information and consulting on vouchers. We show that enrolment in private schools responds sluggishly to changes in tu ition induced by vouchers. Under stringent assumptions, we estima te the slopes of demand and supply of private education in the la rgest Italian region, Lombardy, during the first two years since implementation of a voucher scheme, and provide a quantitative as sessment of the long – term impact of vouchers on tuition fees an d enrolment in private schools |
| Keywords: | school vouchers |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mil:wpdepa:2005-06&r=lab |
| By: | Nicole Maestas (RAND) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes labor force re-entry after retirement in an effort to understand whether these “unretirement” transitions are largely unexpected (perhaps resulting from failures in planning or unexpected financial shocks) or planned (perhaps representing a more complex retirement process). Nearly one-half of retirees follow a nontraditional retirement path that involves partial retirement and/or unretirement, and the unretirement rate among those observed at least five years after their first retirement is 24 percent. The unretirement rate is even higher among those retiring at younger ages (as high as 36 percent among those retiring at ages 51-52). I find that unretirement was anticipated for all but nine percent of retirees. If anything, expectations err on the side of excessive pessimism about the future rather than unwarranted optimism. Unretirement appears to be qualitatively similar to partial retirement and there is some evidence of a substantial correlation in the post-retirement labor supply transitions of married couples. |
| Date: | 2004–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mrr:papers:wp085&r=lab |
| By: | Alan L. Gustman (Dartmouth College and NBER); Thomas L. Steimeier (Texas Tech University) |
| Abstract: | This paper introduces the age at which Social Security benefits are claimed as an additional outcome in a structural model of retirement and wealth. The model is then used to simulate the effects of abolishing the remainder of the Social Security earnings test, between age 62 and the full retirement age. Estimates are based on data for married men from the first six waves of the Health and Retirement Study. From age 62 through full retirement age, the earnings test reduces the share working full time by about four percent of the married male population, which entails a reduction of about ten percent in the number of married males of that age at full time work. However, abolishing the earnings test would adversely affect the cash-flow of the system. If the earnings test were abolished between early and full retirement age, the share of married men claiming Social Security benefits would increase by about 10 percentage points, and average benefit payments would increase by about $1,800 per recipient, to be offset eventually by actuarially fair or better than fair reductions in benefit payouts throughout their 70s, 80s and 90s. One can increase the employment of older persons either by abolishing the earnings test or by increasing the early entitlement age under Social Security. A major difference on the funding side is that abolishing the earning test results in an earlier flow of benefit payments from Social Security, worsening the cash-flow problems of the system, while increasing the early entitlement age delays the flow of benefit payments from the system, improving its liquidity. |
| Date: | 2004–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mrr:papers:wp090&r=lab |
| By: | Isaac Ehrlich; Jinyoung Kim |
| Abstract: | The worldwide problem with pay-as-you-go (PAYG) social security systems isn't just financial. This study indicates that these systems may have exerted adverse effects on key demographic factors, private savings, and long-term growth rates. Through a comprehensive endogenous-growth model where human capital is the engine of growth, family choices affect human capital formation, and family formation itself is a choice variable, we show that social security taxes and benefits can create adverse incentive effects on family formation and subsequent household choices, and that these effects cannot be fully neutralized by counteracting intergenerational transfers within families. We implement the model using calibrated simulations as well as panel data from 57 countries over 32 years (1960-92). We find that PAYG tax measures account for a sizeable part of the downward trends in family formation and fertility worldwide, and for a slowdown in the rates of savings and economic growth, especially in OECD countries. |
| JEL: | J1 O1 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11121&r=lab |
| By: | Eric A. Hanushek; Ludger Woessmann |
| Abstract: | Even though some countries track students into differing-ability schools by age 10, others keep their entire secondary-school system comprehensive. To estimate the effects of such institutional differences in the face of country heterogeneity, we employ an international differences-in-differences approach. We identify tracking effects by comparing differences in outcome between primary and secondary school across tracked and non-tracked systems. Six international student assessments provide eight pairs of achievement contrasts for between 18 and 26 cross-country comparisons. The results suggest that early tracking increases educational inequality. While less clear, there is also a tendency for early tracking to reduce mean performance. Therefore, there does not appear to be any equity-efficiency trade-off. |
| JEL: | I2 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11124&r=lab |
| By: | Michael Baker; Kevin Milligan |
| Abstract: | Maternity leaves can affect mothers%u2019 and infants%u2019 welfare if they first affect the amount of time working women stay at home post birth. We provide new evidence of the labor supply effects of these leaves from an analysis of the introduction and expansion of job-protected maternity leave in Canada. The substantial variation in leave entitlements across mothers by time and space is likely exogenous to their unobserved characteristics. This is important because unobserved heterogeneity correlated with leave entitlement potentially biases many previous studies of this topic. We find that modest mandates of 17-18 weeks do not increase the time mothers spend at home. The physical demands of birth and private arrangements appear to render short mandates redundant. These mandates do, however, decrease the proportion of women quitting their jobs, increase leave taking, and increase the proportion returning to their pre-birth employers. In contrast, we find that expansions of job-protected leaves to lengths up to 70 weeks do increase the time spent at home (as well as leave-taking and job continuity). We also examine whether this increase in time at home affects infant health, finding no evidence of an effect on the incidence of low birth weight or infant mortality. |
| JEL: | J13 J32 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11135&r=lab |
| By: | Christel Vermeersch; Michael Kremer (Harvard University) |
| Abstract: | Vermeersch and Kremer examine the effects of subsidized school meals on school participation, educational achievement, and school finance in a developing country setting. They use data from a program that was implemented in 25 randomly chosen preschools in a pool of 50. Children’s school participation was 30 percent higher in the treatment group than in the comparison group. The meals program led to higher curriculum test scores, but only in schools where the teacher was relatively experienced prior to the program. The school meals displaced teaching time and led to larger class sizes. Despite improved incentives, teacher absenteeism remained at a high level of 30 percent. Treatment schools raised their fees, and comparison schools close to treatment schools decreased their fees. Some of the price effects are caused by a combination of capacity constraints and pupil transfers that would not happen if the school meals were ordered in all schools. The intention-to-treat estimator of the effect of the randomized program incorporates those price effects, and therefore it should be considered a lower bound on the effect of generalized school meals. This insight on price effects generalizes to other randomized program evaluations. This paper—a product of the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management 2, Africa Technical Families—is part of a larger effort in the region to increase our understanding of the impact of programs aimed at reaching the Millennium Development Goals. |
| Keywords: | Education; Health & Population |
| Date: | 2005–02–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:3523&r=lab |
| By: | Christophe Muller (Departamento de Fundamentos del Análisis Económico Universidad de Alicante, Campus de San Vicente); Christophe Nordman (DIAL, IRD, Paris) |
| Abstract: | (français) Nous analysons les rendements du capital humain à partir de données liées employeurs-employés collectées en Tunisie en 1999 et indiquons comment ces rendements diffèrent de ceux généralement obtenus dans les pays industrialisés avec ce type de données. Nous développons une nouvelle méthode fondée sur une analyse factorielle des caractéristiques d'entreprise qui rapproche nos résultats, en ce qui concerne le rendement de l’éducation, de ceux que l'on obtient en utilisant des équations de salaire à effets fixes d'entreprise. Notre technique d'estimation fournit une interprétation de ces effets en distinguant l'impact sur les salaires du capital humain propres aux établissements. En outre, l'inclusion dans l'analyse de trois caractéristiques d'entreprise facilement mobilisables procure des résultats très proches de ceux obtenus lorsque toute l'information disponible sur la structure d'appariement des données est utilisée. L'introduction de l'approche factorielle confirme l'idée selon laquelle le capital humain peut constituer une source positive d'externalité intra entreprise. Un travailleur d'une qualification donnée serait plus productif et donc mieux rémunéré dans un environnement fortement doté en capital humain. Toutefois, les travailleurs pauvres ne semblent pas pouvoir bénéficier des qualifications de leur entreprise. En revanche, les pauvres profitent d'un emploi dans le secteur des textiles en termes de rémunération, contrairement aux travailleurs à salaires médians et élevés. _________________________________ (english) We study the returns to human capital for workers observed in Tunisian matched worker-firm data in 1999. This tells us how these returns differ from those obtained in industrialised countries with matched data. We develop a new method based on multivariate analysis of firm characteristics, which allows us most of the benefits obtained by introducing firm fixed effects in wage equations for studying the effect of education. It also provides a human capital interpretation of these firm effects. Moreover, using three firm characteristics easily collectable yields results close to those obtained by using the matched structure of the data. Wage regressions including the computed factors confirm that human capital is associated with positive intra-firm externality on wages. Therefore, a given worker would be more productive and better paid in an environment strongly endowed in human capital. However, the poorest workers do not take advantage of human capital in the firm. Conversely, the poor benefit from working in the textile sector in terms of wages unlike the middle and high wage workers. |
| Keywords: | wage, returns to human capital, matched worker-firm data, quantile regressions, factor analysis, Tunisia |
| JEL: | J24 J31 O12 |
| Date: | 2004–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dia:wpaper:dt200409&r=lab |
| By: | Javier Herrera (DIAL, IRD, Paris); Gerardo David Rosas Shady (Inter American Development Bank, University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, DIAL) |
| Abstract: | (english) Traditional labor market analysis based solely on the net unemployment rate fails to explain the apparent paradox between a relatively moderate unemployment rate in Peru (around 10%, with a weak sensibility to wide macroeconomic fluctuations), and the fact that unemployment is one of the major issues in Peru. One possible explanation is that this static indicator of cross section net unemployment balance is compatible with high flows in and out of employment states. To address these issues we needed to conduct a dynamic analysis using panel data. Using the Peruvian national household survey (ENAHO), we constructed a panel of working age individuals at the national level for the period 1997-1999. Like previous work in developing countries, we found that there is an important degree of job mobility in Peru. We also found that most of the transitions occur between employment and inactivity instead of between employment and unemployment. We also showed that the rate of permanent unemployment is very low so that unemployment would be essentially a frictional phenomenon. Further, considering the different transition states, we elaborated an unconditional transition profile, including individual and household characteristics, like gender, age and education levels for example, associated with each transition status. Finally, after examining these labor market transitions and the possible sample selection bias, we estimated a multinomial logit model. This model allowed us to appreciate the (conditional) incidence of individual and household characteristics as well as the effects of different shocks on the labor transition states. _________________________________ (français) Les analyses traditionnelles du marché du travail s’avèrent incapables d’expliquer le paradoxe apparent entre un taux de chômage relativement modéré dans un pays tel que le Pérou (environ 10%, taux peu sensible aux fortes fluctuations macro-économiques) et la perception d’une grave crise de l’emploi. Une explication possible pourrait résider dans le fait que cet indicateur statique en coupe instantanée ne mesure pas les flux élevés entre les situations d’emploi et d’inemploi. Pour analyser ces questions, il est nécessaire de conduire une analyse dynamique sur données de panel. Nous avons ainsi construit un panel national d’individus en âge de travailler pour la période 1997-1999 à partir de l’enquête péruvienne auprès des ménages (ENAHO). Comme d’autres études réalisées dans des pays en développement, nous constatons qu’il existe une importante mobilité de l’emploi au Pérou. Nous trouvons également que la plupart des transitions interviennent entre emploi et inactivité plutôt qu’entre emploi et chômage. Le taux de chômage permanent apparaît très faible et le chômage serait donc essentiellement un phénomène frictionnel. Pour aller plus loin, nous avons élaborés des profils de transition inconditionnels, incluant les caractéristiques individuelles et du ménage, telles que le genre, l’âge, et le niveau d’éducation, associé avec chaque état de transition. Finalement, après avoir examiné ces transitions sur le marché du travail et les biais de sélection possibles, nous avons estimé un modèle logit multinomial. Ce modèle nous a permis d’apprécier l’incidence (conditionnelle) des caractéristiques individuelles et des ménages ainsi que des différents chocs sur les états de transition en matière d’emploi. |
| Date: | 2003–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dia:wpaper:dt200314&r=lab |