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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Eliane El Badaoui; Eleonora Matteazzi |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the extent to which motherhood affects women's career accomplishments and wages in Italy and the UK. Using the EU-SILC 2009 data, a decomposition of the motherhood wage gap is implemented after accounting for double selection in labor market participation and motherhood. We find evidence of a negative correlation between labor market and fertility decisions. The results show that motherhood has no adverse effects on women's career path in Italy, and that job segregation explains most of the motherhood wage gap in the UK. Empirical findings suggest that the timing of motherhood and job continuity affect significantly the female wage profile. |
| Keywords: | Motherhood, Labor market participation, Wage gap, Career. |
| JEL: | C34 J21 J24 J31 |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2014-30&r=lab |
| By: | Holz, Carsten A. (BOFIT) |
| Abstract: | The purpose of this paper is to ascertain how wages are being determined in China during the reform period. The paper focuses on the development of the regulatory framework since 1978 and proceeds by examining official regulations regarding labor market institutions and wage setting, and by evaluating their potential implications for actual wage setting. |
| Keywords: | wage determination; labor market institutions; minimum wages; wage classification system; wage level and structure; labor contracts; collective bargaining; public sector wages; wage-performance link |
| JEL: | J30 J31 J41 J45 M52 M54 M55 P23 |
| Date: | 2014–05–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:bofitp:2014_013&r=lab |
| By: | Carrington, William J. (Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland); Fallick, Bruce C. (Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland) |
| Abstract: | The earnings of workers are reduced for many years after being displaced from their jobs, and those workers and their families face increased risk of other problems as well. The ills suffered by displaced workers motivated several recent expansions of government programs, including the unemployment insurance system, and have spurred calls for wage insurance that would provide longerrun earnings replacement. However, while the magnitude of the losses is relatively clear, the theory of why displacement matters is scattered and somewhat undeveloped. Much of the policy discussion appears to interpret displacementinduced losses through the lens of specifi c human capital theory, and there is considerable empirical support for that model. But there are several other theories of why job displacement is costly. This paper reviews theories of costly job displacement and discusses their consistency with the available empirical evidence. We find that theories of human capital and matching are an important perspective on the losses of displaced workers, but we cannot rule out important roles for other theories, some of which suggest different policy responses. |
| Keywords: | Displaced workers; earnings loss; human capital; matching |
| JEL: | D13 D82 I20 J31 J63 J64 |
| Date: | 2014–06–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedcwp:1405&r=lab |
| By: | Arseneau, David M. (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)); Epstein, Brendan (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)) |
| Abstract: | Skill-mismatch employment occurs when high-skilled individuals accept employment in jobs for which they are over-qualified. These employment relationships can be beneficial because they allow high-skilled individuals to more rapidly transition out of unemployment. They come at the cost, however, in the form of lower wage compensation. Moreover, an externality arises as high-skilled individuals do not take into account the effect that their search activity in the market for low-tech jobs has on low-skilled individuals. This paper presents a tractable general equilibrium model featuring mismatch employment and on-the-job search to articulate these tradeoffs. We derive a set of efficiency conditions that describe the labor market distortions associated with these two model features and illustrate how they alter the standard notion of the labor wedges inherent in general equilibrium search models. Finally, we calibrate the model to U.S. data and show that the distortions associated with mismatch employment are largely distributional and can be quantitatively large. |
| Keywords: | Job-to-job transitions; labor market frictions; skill premium |
| Date: | 2014–06–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2014-42&r=lab |
| By: | Robert Dixon (Department of Economics, The University of Melbourne); Guay C. Lim (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne); Jan C. van Ours (Department of Economics and CentER, Tilburg University; Department of Economics, The University of Melbourne; CEPR, United Kingdom; CESifo, Germany; and IZA, Germany) |
| Abstract: | This paper presents an analysis of labour market dynamics, in particular of flows in the labour market and how they interact and affect the evolution of unemployment rates and participation rates, the two main indicators of labour market performance. Our analysis has two special features. First, apart from the two labour market states – employment and unemployment – we consider a third state – out of the labour force. Second, we study net rather than gross flows, where net refers to the balance of flows between any two labour market states. Distinguishing a third state is important because the labour market flows to and from that state are quantitatively important. Focussing on net flows simplifies the complexity of interactions between the flows and allows us to perform a dynamic analysis in a structural vector-autoregression framework. We find that a shock to the net flow from unemployment to employment drives the unemployment rate and the participation rate in opposite directions while a shock to the net flow from not in the labour force to unemployment drives the rates in the same direction. |
| Keywords: | Net labour market flows, unemployment rate, participation rate |
| JEL: | E17 E24 J21 J64 |
| Date: | 2014–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iae:iaewps:wp2014n13&r=lab |
| By: | Rainer Eppel (WIFO); Helmut Mahringer (WIFO); Andrea Weber (WIFO) |
| Abstract: | We combine information from a job-seeker survey and two sources of administrative data to shed light on the job search behaviour and job search success of the unemployed. Our particular focus is on the way the Public Employment Service (AMS) shapes job search effort and outcomes in terms of the exit rate to work and of post-unemployment job match quality. Job-seekers attach a high value to internet job search, but social networks are by far the most promising job search channel. The AMS has a central role in the job search process of the unemployed, particularly for job-seekers with low education and long unemployment record. We find a positive link between the amount of AMS counselling and job search effort. Our results indicate that the AMS is effective in facilitating exit from unemployment to paid work – directly, through placing of jobs and increasing the efficiency of job search, as well as indirectly, by stimulating job search effort. The jobs placed by this intermediary do not significantly differ in job tenure from those generated by other channels, but they are rather poorly paid. After adjustment for differences in covariates, monthly starting wages are significantly lower for people placed via the AMS compared with those successful with the internet and private employment agencies. |
| Keywords: | Job search, Public employment service, Job match quality |
| Date: | 2014–06–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wfo:wpaper:y:2014:i:471&r=lab |
| By: | Elton Beqiraj; Massimiliano Tancioni |
| Abstract: | Two labor market targeted …scal policies, a hiring subsidy and a wage subsidy for new hires of labor, are evaluated, and their macroeconomic e¤ects compared with those of standard …scal instruments. The analyses are based on an extension of a monetary, open economy, search and matching model in which a distinction between the wage negotiated by newly hired workers and incumbents is introduced. The model is estimated with Bayesian techniques using data for high unemployment countries of the EZ periphery (Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain). Posterior simulations show that, the labor market policies are not superior to standard fi…scal expansions in stimulating a timely response of economic activity, and their output and employment-enhanching effects are dominant only in the long term and at the Greece and Portugal estimates. The consideration of a liquidity trap environment marginally reinforces these results, showing that expansionary policy actions triggering a defl‡ation can be procyclical when the interest rate zero-lower-bound binds. |
| Keywords: | wage and hiring subsidies, newly hired workers, search and matching, fiÂ…scal multiplier, zero lower bound, Bayesian estimation. |
| JEL: | E62 H25 H30 J20 C11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sap:wpaper:wp165&r=lab |
| By: | Karbownik, Krzysztof (Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the determinants of teacher turnover using matched employee-employer panel data from Swedish lower and upper secondary schools in a market-oriented institutional environment with a growing private sector and individually negotiated wages. I find statistically significant and robust negative correlations between mobility and monetary compensations. Unlike previous research, I do not find robust evidence that the share of minorities correlates positively with turnover. The positive association exists; however, in the case of private and upper secondary institutions. Finally, private institutions experience higher turnover. |
| Keywords: | Teacher turnover; non-pecuniary factors; pecuniary factors |
| JEL: | I21 J44 |
| Date: | 2014–06–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2014_013&r=lab |
| By: | Davis, Steven J.; Röttger, Christof; Warning, Anja; Weber, Enzo |
| Abstract: | We develop new evidence on job recruitments and vacancy durations using a rich source of data on individual hires. Our core data set contains 55,000 recruitments into vacant job positions for stratified random samples of German employers from 2000 to 2010. We have information about the employer, the job position and the newly hired worker for all recruitments – including firm size, occupation, qualification requirements, previous labour market status of the new hire, and whether the job is a new position. We measure recruitment duration and the lag from recruitment to first day of work (start lag), which sum to the full vacancy duration. In addition, we link our micro data on recruitments and new hires to additional data on contemporaneous labour market conditions at the regional, occupation and industry levels. Our analysis finds a mean recruitment duration of 49 calendar days or 34 working days and a mean start lag of 27 calendar days and 19 working days, for a total vacancy duration of 76 calendar days and 53 working days, strongly varying between occupations. Hazard functions fit to micro data reveal longer recruitment durations in Eastern Germany and in larger firms and shorter recruitment durations under slack labour market conditions. Highly relevant for the length of the start lag is whether the hiring process goes as planned: If the recruitment duration is longer than the intended total vacancy duration, the start lag is significantly shorter, reflecting the specific efforts of employers in this case to fill the position as soon as possible. The use of Public Employment Services and the hiring of a person previously unemployed show significant effects on the start lag. |
| Keywords: | Recruitment; Vacancy; Duration; Germany |
| JEL: | J23 J63 |
| Date: | 2014–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bay:rdwiwi:29914&r=lab |
| By: | Lorenzo Burlon (Bank of Italy); Montserrat Vilalta-Bufà (University of Barcelona) |
| Abstract: | Technological progress affects early retirement in two opposing ways. On the one hand, it increases real wages and thus produces an incentive to postpone retirement. On the other hand, it erodes workers' skills, making early retirement more likely. Using the Health and Retirement Study surveys, we re-examine the effect of technical progress on early retirement, finding that when the technical change is small the erosion effect dominates, but when it is large the wage effect dominates. Our results imply that retraining cost is a strongly concave function with respect to technical progress. |
| Keywords: | technical progress, retraining, retirement |
| JEL: | J24 J26 O33 |
| Date: | 2014–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_963_14&r=lab |
| By: | Richard Duhautois (CEE - Centre d'études de l'emploi - Ministère de l'Enseignement supérieur et Recherche - Ministère du Travail, de l'Emploi et de la Santé, ERUDITE - Equipe de Recherche sur l'Utilisation des Données Individuelles Temporelles en Economie - Université Paris-Est Créteil Val-de-Marne (UPEC) : EA437 - Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée (UPEMLV)); Fabrice Gilles (EQUIPPE - ECONOMIE QUANTITATIVE, INTEGRATION, POLITIQUES PUBLIQUES ET ECONOMETRIE - Université Lille I - Sciences et technologies - Université Lille II - Droit et santé - Université Lille III - Sciences humaines et sociales - PRES Université Lille Nord de France, TEPP - Travail, Emploi et Politiques Publiques - CNRS : FR3435 - Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée (UPEMLV)) |
| Abstract: | In France, policies that aim at reducing labour cost have extended to more and more workers since the beginning of the 90s. Evaluations of the effect of payroll tax reduction often use estimations of labour demand equations. In this paper, we consider the impact of labour tax cuts on job creations and destructions through the Fillon reform (2003), by using a fixed effect instrumental variable approach and a sectora l pseudo panel dataset. Over 2002-2005, our estimates show that PTR let job flows unchanged. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-01006652&r=lab |
| By: | Martin Kahanec; Lucia Mýtna Kureková |
| Abstract: | This paper evaluates the mobility patterns of Slovaks into the rest of the European Union (EU) following Slovakia’s EU accession in 2004 and through the Great Recession. Combining information from various data sources including the Slovak Labor Force Survey and conducting our own statistical analysis of selectivity into migration, we study whether and how migration responded to asymmetric economic shocks at home and abroad. We identify a number of shifts in the directionality and composition of migration flows in terms of the destinations, gender, age, educational attainment and occupation, reflecting changing labor market conditions in receiving countries and Slovakia. We show that besides the standard demographic factors, migration propensity was higher among the unemployed and from the more depressed regions of Slovakia. We conclude that labor migration has served as an important adjustment mechanism in the country and more generally in the EU labor market. |
| Keywords: | Adjustment, EU enlargement, labor market, migration, Slovakia |
| JEL: | F22 J61 |
| Date: | 2014–06–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cel:dpaper:23&r=lab |
| By: | Fabrice Gilles (EQUIPPE - ECONOMIE QUANTITATIVE, INTEGRATION, POLITIQUES PUBLIQUES ET ECONOMETRIE - Université Lille I - Sciences et technologies - Université Lille II - Droit et santé - Université Lille III - Sciences humaines et sociales - PRES Université Lille Nord de France, TEPP - Travail, Emploi et Politiques Publiques - CNRS : FR3435 - Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée (UPEMLV)) |
| Abstract: | According to the literature on work-sharing, productivity gains on capital equipment may increase employment while diminishing weekly working hours. In this article, we evaluate the impact of the French 35-hour working week on capital operating time. We merge the French survey on Capital Operating Time (COT, Banque de France, Central Bank of France; 1989-2004) and administrative Working Time Reduction agreements files (WTR,DARES, French Ministry of Labour; May 2003). We construct shift-work-based capital operating time indicators. Using differences-in-differences econometric models, we show that the implementation of the 35-h our work week did not induce any reduction in COT. Hence, firms increase shift-work to compensate for the decrease in working hours. |
| Keywords: | working time regulation ; capital operating time ; causal effect ; differences-in-differences models. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-01006765&r=lab |
| By: | Karbownik, Krzysztof (Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the job mobility of teachers with different skills using matched employer-employee data from Swedish secondary schools. In addition to standard quality measures, I have access to population-wide data on cognitive and non-cognitive assessments of males born in 1951 or later. The results show that high-quality teachers are less mobile than others, and that there is no significant correlation between turnover and share of minority students. Interestingly, teachers with better skills are less likely to leave the profession, which suggests that the documented drop in the quality of inflowing teachers may partly be offset by a higher tendency for high quality teachers to stay in the profession. |
| Keywords: | Teacher turnover; teacher quality; student composition |
| JEL: | I21 J44 |
| Date: | 2014–06–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2014_014&r=lab |
| By: | Bjuggren, Carl Magnus (Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)) |
| Abstract: | In this study I present empirical evidence that employment in family firms is less sensitive to performance and product market fluctuations, both at the industry and at the firm level. This supports the idea that family firms are able to offer their employees implicit employment protection. Family firms are believed to have longer time horizons, and are as owners more easily identified with their company and its actions. These are features that could make family firms more cautious in terms of adjusting their employment. I confirm previous findings that family firms are less sensitive to sales fluctuations at the industry level and I show that this also holds for fluctuations in value added. I extend the analysis to show that family firms are less sensitive to unanticipated industry shocks by filtering out the trend component. When investigating idiosyncratic shocks to the firm, I find that family firms are less anxious to translate temporary shocks in performance into changes in employment. By using full population data from tax registers, I am able to identify all family firms, both listed and non-listed. This has previously not been feasible. |
| Keywords: | Family Firms; Risk Sharing; Employment Protection; Shocks |
| JEL: | D22 G32 J21 J23 L25 |
| Date: | 2014–06–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1028&r=lab |
| By: | Colombino, Ugo; Narazani, Edlira (University of Turin) |
| Abstract: | TGender based taxation (GBT) has been recently proposed as a promising policy in order to close the gender gap, i.e. promote gender equality and improve women’s status in the labour market and within the family. We use a microeconometric model of household labour supply in order to evaluate, with Italian data, the behavioural and welfare effects of GBT as compared to other policies based on different optimal taxation principles. The comparison is interesting because GBT, although technically correct, might face implementation difficulties not shared by other policies that in turn might produce comparable benefits. Our results support to some extent the expectations of GBT’s proponents. However, it is not an unquestionable success. GBT induces a modest increase of women’s employment, but similar effects can be attained by universal subsidies on low wages. When the policies are evaluated in terms of welfare, GBT ranks first among single women but among couples and in the whole population the best policies are unconditional transfers and/or subsidies on low wages. |
| Date: | 2014–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uto:dipeco:201412&r=lab |
| By: | Haltenhof, Samuel (University of Michigan); Lee, Seung Jung (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)); Stebunovs, Viktors (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)) |
| Abstract: | We study the existence and economic significance of bank lending channels that affect employment in U.S. manufacturing industries. In particular, we address the question of how a dramatic worsening of firm and consumer access to bank credit, such as the one observed over the Great Recession, translates into job losses in these industries. To identify these channels, we rely on differences in the degree of external finance dependence and of asset tangibility across manufacturing industries and in the sensitivity of these industries' output to changes in the supply of consumer credit. We show that household access to bank loans matters more for employment than firm access to local bank loans. Our results suggest that, over the recent financial crisis, tightening access to commercial and industrial loans and consumer installment loans explains jointly about a quarter of the drop in employment in the manufacturing sector. In addition, a decrease in the availability of home equity loans explains an extra one-tenth of the drop. |
| Keywords: | Bank credit channels; bank lending standards; home equity extraction; credit crunch; employment; job losses; Great Recession |
| Date: | 2013–10–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2014-06&r=lab |
| By: | L. Rachel Ngai (London School of Economics (LSE), Centre for Economic Performance (CEP); Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM)); Barbara Petrongolo (Queen Mary, School of Economics and Finance; London School of Economics (LSE), Centre for Economic Performance (CEP)) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the role of the rise of services in the narrowing of gender gaps in hours and wages in recent decades. We document the between-industry component of the rise in female work for the U.S., and propose a model economy with goods, services and home production, in which women have a comparative advantage in producing market and home services. The rise of services, driven by structural transformation and marketization of home production, acts as a gender-biased demand shift raising women?s relative wages and market hours. Quantitatively, the model accounts for an important share of the observed trends. |
| Keywords: | gender gaps, structural transformation, marketization |
| JEL: | E24 J22 J16 |
| Date: | 2014–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cfm:wpaper:1404&r=lab |