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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Behaghel, Luc (Paris School of Economics); Dromundo, Sofia (OECD); Gurgand, Marc (Paris School of Economics); Hazard, Yagan (Paris School of Economics); Zuber, Thomas (Banque de France) |
| Abstract: | We analyze the employment effects of directing job seekers' applications toward establishments likely to recruit. We run a two-sided randomization design involving about 800, 000 job seekers and 40, 000 establishments, based on an empirical model that recommends each job seeker to firms so as to maximize total potential employment. Our intervention induces a 1% increase in job finding rates for short term contracts. This impact comes from a targeting effect combining (i) a modest increase in job seekers' applications to the very firms that were recommended to them, and (ii) a high success rate conditional on applying to these firms. Indeed, the success rate of job seekers' applications varies considerably across firms: the efficiency of applications sent to recommended firms is 2.7 times higher than the efficiency of applications to the average firm. This suggests that there can be substantial gains from better targeting job search, leveraging firm-level heterogeneity. |
| Keywords: | recommender systems, matching, RCT, active labor market policies |
| JEL: | J64 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16781&r=lab |
| By: | Amorim, Guilherme (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign); Britto, Diogo (University of Milan Bicocca); Fonseca, Alexandre (Federal Revenue of Brazil); Sampaio, Breno (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco) |
| Abstract: | We study the effects of job loss and unemployment insurance (UI) on health among Brazilian workers. We construct a novel dataset linking individual-level administrative records on employment, hospital discharges, and mortality for a 17-year period, rarely available in the context of developing countries. Leveraging mass layoffs for identification, we find that job loss increases hospitalization (+33%) and mortality risks (+23%) for male workers, while women are not affected. These effects are pervasive over the distribution of age, tenure, income and education, and men's children are also negatively affected. Remarkably, about half of these impacts are driven by external causes associated with accidents and the violent Brazilian context. Using a regression discontinuity design, we show that access to UI partially mitigates the adverse effects of job loss on health. Our results indicate that the health costs of job loss are only partially explained by the income losses associated with job displacement. |
| Keywords: | job loss, unemployment insurance, hospitalization, deaths |
| JEL: | I12 J63 J65 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16790&r=lab |
| By: | Diego A. Martin (Growth Lab) |
| Abstract: | Do women apply more for jobs when they know the hiring probability of female job seekers directly from employers? I implemented a randomized control trial and a double-incentivized resume rating to elicit the preferences of employers and job seekers for candidates and vacancies in Iraq. The treatment reveals the job offer rate for women, calculated using the employers’ selection of women divided by the total number of female candidates. After revealing the treatment, the women applied for jobs by three more percentage points than the men in the control group. This paper highlights the value of revealing employers’ preferences to improve the match between female candidates and employers when women underestimate the chances of finding a job. |
| Keywords: | Iraq, Application for jobs, Information treatment, Labor market matching, Gender difference |
| JEL: | J61 J64 J70 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cid:wpfacu:157a&r=lab |
| By: | Brown, Dan (GiveWell); De Cao, Elisabetta (University of Bologna) |
| Abstract: | Child maltreatment is pervasive, often undetected, yet harmful. We investigate whether it is impacted by unemployment by leveraging unique administrative data including all reported cases of child abuse and neglect in the United States from 2004 to 2012. Using an industry shift-share instrument to identify county-level unemployment effects, we find a substantial rise in neglect. The likely channel is lower quality-time spent with children rather than decreased financial investments. Expenditures on children remain stable during recessions. Instead, higher local-area unemployment rate reduces parental childcare time, worsens mental health, and contributes to an increase in one-parent households. |
| Keywords: | child abuse and neglect, unemployment rate, recession, Bartik, mental health |
| JEL: | I10 D10 J12 J13 K42 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16799&r=lab |
| By: | Junquera, Álvaro F. (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) |
| Abstract: | Despite being widely regarded as effective labor market interventions, the impact of job search programs on employment remains contested. Recent research challenges the assumption that the intensity of such programs is directly related with its effectiveness. We evaluate the effects of two treatments of an Italian active labour market program called Assegno per il Lavoro. Each intervention is made up of a voucher to fund job search assistance and a performance-based payment related to job search brokerage. Participants are assigned to a certain group with a certain treatment endowment that is increasing in function of a scoring variable. Leveraging this design, we applied a regression discontinuity analysis to estimate effects on the employment quantity and on the employment quality. We found null effects on the average of worked days for the two treatment comparisons, with transient small effects during the first year for the high endowment. Significant increases of approximately one month were observed at the median of the distribution for certain semesters, but later the effects fade away. This is the first paper studying the effect of the intensity of job search actions on employment in a European context. The main policy implication is a shift from a focus on intensity to a focus on other design elements. |
| Date: | 2024–02–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:rjshu&r=lab |
| By: | Patricia Cortés; Jacob French; Jessica Pan; Basit Zafar |
| Abstract: | We assess the role of information gaps in understanding gender differences in negotiation behavior by conducting a randomized information experiment on the 2018 to 2020 graduating cohorts of undergraduate business majors from Boston University. Prior to starting their job search, treated students were provided with objective information about the gender gap in negotiation among their peers along with the earnings changes conditional on negotiating. We find sizable immediate effects on negotiation intentions that persist to actual negotiation behavior, particularly for men. While the treatment affects women's negotiation behavior through belief-updating, the effects on men's behavior are primarily through increased salience of the information. Further, we find some evidence that gender-specific treatment spillovers likely contribute to the smaller average treatment effects on behavior for women. Overall, our findings suggest that such information interventions can help to nudge women who have potentially large financial returns to negotiation to realize these gains. |
| JEL: | J16 J31 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:32154&r=lab |
| By: | Audinga Baltrunaite (Bank of Italy and CEPR); Alessandra Casarico (Bocconi University, CESIfo and Dondena); Lucia Rizzica (Bank of Italy) |
| Abstract: | We study the presence and the extent of gender differences in reference letters for graduate students in economics and finance, and how these differences relate to early labor market outcomes. To these ends, we build a novel rich dataset and combine Natural Language Processing techniques with standard regression analysis. We find that men are described more often as brilliant and women as hardworking and diligent. We show that the former (latter) description relates positively (negatively) with various subsequent career outcomes. We provide evidence that the observed differences in the way candidates are described are driven by implicit gender stereotypes. |
| Keywords: | gender bias, research institutions, professional labor markets, word embeddings |
| JEL: | I23 J16 J44 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_1438_24&r=lab |
| By: | Sangyup Choi; Davide Furceri; Seung Yong Yoo |
| Abstract: | The real option value theory posits that non-convex adjustment costs pertaining to a firm’s input are central to comprehending the consequences of increased uncertainty. This paper leverages the diversity observed at both sectoral and country levels in the degree of irreversibility associated with hiring and firing, a critical factor generating what is commonly referred to as “wait-and-see†behavior in times of heightened uncertainty. Our empirical findings reveal two key insights. First, in alignment with the concept of second-moment shocks, uncertainty shocks predominantly influence the labor market through the extensive margin rather than the intensive margin. Second, the effects of uncertainty shocks exhibit pronounced heterogeneity across countries and industries, and the adverse employment effects (extensive margin) are amplified in a country with strict employment protection or in an industry characterized by a higher natural layoff rate, consistent with the real option theory. |
| Keywords: | uncertainty shocks, irreversibility, wait-and-see, employment protection legislation, natural layoff rate, difference-in-difference |
| JEL: | E24 J20 J50 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:een:camaaa:2024-17&r=lab |
| By: | Wei Yang Tham; Joseph Staudt; Elisabeth Ruth Perlman; Stephanie D. Cheng |
| Abstract: | We study how delays in NIH grant funding affect the career outcomes of research personnel. Using comprehensive earnings and tax records linked to university transaction data along with a difference-in-differences design, we find that a funding interruption of more than 30 days has a substantial effect on job placements for personnel who work in labs with a single NIH R01 research grant, including a 3 percentage point (40%) increase in the probability of not working in the US. Incorporating information from the full 2020 Decennial Census and data on publications, we find that about half of those induced into nonemployment appear to permanently leave the US and are 90% less likely to publish in a given year, with even larger impacts for trainees (postdocs and graduate students). Among personnel who continue to work in the US, we find that interrupted personnel earn 20% less than their continuously-funded peers, with the largest declines concentrated among trainees and other non-faculty personnel (such as staff and undergraduates). Overall, funding delays account for about 5% of US nonemployment in our data, indicating that they have a meaningful effect on the scientific labor force at the national level. |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:24-08&r=lab |
| By: | Marjan Petreski; Stefan Tanevski; Alejandro D. Jacobo |
| Abstract: | Using a Taylor rule amended with official reserves movements, we derive country-specific monetary shocks and employ a local projections-estimator for tracking gender-disaggregated labor-market responses in 99 developing economies from 2009 to 2021. Results show that women experience more negative post-shock employment responses than men, contributing to a deepening of the gender gaps on the labor market. After the shock, women leave the labor market more so than men, which results in an apparently intact or even improved unemployment outcome for women. We find limited evidence of sector-specific reaction to interest rates. Additionally, we identify an intense worsening of women-s position on the labor market in high-growth environments as well under monetary policy tightening. Developing Asia and Latin America experience the most significant detrimental effects on women's employment, Africa exhibits a slower manifestation of the monetary shocks-impact and developing Europe shows the mildest effects. |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2402.05729&r=lab |
| By: | Hermle, Johannes (UC Berkeley); Herold, Elena (Ifo Institute for Economic Research); Hildebrand, Nikolaus (MIT) |
| Abstract: | What preferences do partners hold over their relative income within the household? We provide a flexible framework of preferences over relative income within the household that captures various motives, including inequality aversion and a preference for being the primary earner. We study the role of these preferences for marital selection, separation and household public good provision in a marriage market matching model with search frictions. We test the model predictions using large administrative tax data from Germany. We document the existence of a kink point in the relative income distribution at the point of spousal income equality, consistent with the presence of kinked preferences over relative income. We also find the presence of a convex kink in wives' household public good provision, suggesting that women bear the incidence of spousal relative income preferences. To disentangle the preferences of women and men, we implement a survey experiment. Our results indicate that women exhibit inequality aversion while men exhibit a preference for being the primary earner. |
| Keywords: | relative income concerns, relative income distribution |
| JEL: | D63 D64 D91 J12 J16 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16803&r=lab |
| By: | Canavire Bacarreza, Gustavo J. (World Bank); Puerta-Cuartas, Alejandro (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid); Beverinotti, Javier (Inter-American Development Bank) |
| Abstract: | A decline in poverty generally masks regional disparities that are due to varying efficiency among states. Using a generalized true random-effects model, we distinguish between persistent and transient inefficiencies on subnational efficiency to reduce poverty and its determinants in Bolivia. Our findings reveal that states differ in terms of efficiency, with some excelling and others facing challenges. Persistent inefficiency emerges as pivotal, emphasizing the need for long-term policy recalibration. We find that when the macroeconomic conditions in Bolivia allow for a 10 percent reduction in the poverty rate, states can achieve at most an 8.2 percent reduction, and on average, they reduce it by 7.3 percent. Efficiency correlates positively with the tertiary sector's size; relationships with the primary and secondary sectors depend on their size, showing positive associations only if these sectors are fairly large. Additionally, states with lower unemployment and informality tend to be more efficient, highlighting the labor market's crucial role. |
| Keywords: | poverty, Bolivia, efficiency analysis |
| JEL: | C23 D63 I32 O41 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16794&r=lab |
| By: | Eshaghnia, Sadegh S. M. (Center for the Economics of Human Development (CEHD)); Heckman, James J. (University of Chicago); Landerso, Rasmus (Rockwool Foundation Research Unit) |
| Abstract: | This study explores relationships between parental resource trajectories and child development, and their implications for intergenerational mobility. By modifying the child skill formation technology to incorporate new skills during adolescence, we analyze the importance of the timing of family resources on life outcomes, educational attainment and participation in crime. Parental financial resources partially offset deficiencies in nonpecuniary inputs to children's human capital. Estimates of the intergenerational influence on child outcomes are strongly influenced by the choice of lifetime versus snapshot parental income measures. The most predictive ages of children when family resources are measured vary by the outcome analyzed. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational elasticity, lifecycle measures, child development, compensating for family disadvantage |
| JEL: | I24 D31 I30 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16784&r=lab |
| By: | Karol Jan Borowiecki (University of Southern Denmark); Martin Hørlyk Kristensen (University of Southern Denmark); Marc T. Law (University of Vermont) |
| Abstract: | Ludwig van Beethoven, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Frédéric Chopin are household names, but few will recognize Francesca Caccini, Elisabeth Lutyens or Amy M. Beach, who are among the top-10 female composers of all time. Why are female composers overshadowed by their male counterparts? Using novel data on over 17, 000 composers who lived from the sixth to the twentieth centuries, we conduct the first quantitative exploration of the gender gap among classical composers. We use the length of a composer’s biographical entry in Grove Music Online to measure composer prominence, and shed light on the determinants of the gender gap with a focus on the development of composers’ human capital through families, teachers, and institutionalized music education. The evidence suggests that parental musical background matters for composers’ prominence, that the effects of teachers vary by the gender of the composer but the effects of parents do not, and while musician mothers and female teachers are important, they do not narrow the gender gap in composer prominence. We also find that the institutionalization of music education in conservatories increases the relative prominence of female composers. |
| Keywords: | gender gap, human capital, music education, music history, student-teacher interactions, conservatories |
| JEL: | I23 J16 J24 N30 Z11 |
| Date: | 2024–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hes:wpaper:0252&r=lab |
| By: | Yoosoon Chang; Steven N. Durlauf; Bo Hu; Joon Y. Park |
| Abstract: | This paper proposes a fully nonparametric model to investigate the dynamics of intergenerational income mobility. In our model, an individual’s income class probabilities depend on parental income in a manner that accommodates nonlinearities and interactions among various individual characteristics and parental characteristics, including race, education, and parental age at childbearing. Consequently, we offer a generalization of Markov chain mobility models. We employ kernel techniques from machine learning and further regularization for estimating this highly flexible model. Utilizing data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), we find that race and parental education play significant roles in determining the influence of parental income on children’s economic prospects. |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bny:wpaper:0129&r=lab |
| By: | Seltzer, Andrew (Royal Holloway, University of London) |
| Abstract: | The Victorian Factories and Shops Act of 1896, the second minimum wage law in the world, empowered administrative agencies ("Special Boards") to set trade-specific minimum rates based on age, sex, and occupation. Much like modern debates, Victorian supporters of minimum wages argued that they would protect vulnerable workers while opponents argued that they would increase employers' costs, resulting in unintended consequences for workers. Evidence from the actual minimum wages passed under the Act suggests that Boards were loosely constrained by market factors, but also that they had some discretion in minimum wage setting. This discretion was used differently by individual Boards; some essentially followed the market for their trades while others set minimum rates that were binding for at least some workers. To the extent that rates were binding, they tended to reduce inequality among adult male workers, particularly after a 1907 Federal ruling established a living wage for employers with operations in multiple states. However, minimum wages also increased inequality across groups, increasing wages of adult men relative to those of women and youths. The Act formally institutionalised gender-based pay differences, a practice that continued in Australian minimum wage setting for over 70 years. |
| Keywords: | minimum wages, Australia, protective legislation |
| JEL: | N47 N37 J88 |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16788&r=lab |