|
on Labour Economics |
| By: | Rebecca Diamond |
| Abstract: | GLP-1 medications generate large weight loss and may also alter social and economic outcomes. Using the Understanding America Study, I compare women starting GLP-1s for weight loss with matched women who would like to start a GLP-1 but have not. Single women’s marriage/cohabitation rates rise by 29 percentage points and employment among baseline non-employed women rises 27 percentage points after six or more quarters. Existing partnerships do not dissolve, and already-employed women show no upward job mobility. The pattern suggests that part of the female obesity penalty operates at new-match formation rather than only through health or incumbent productivity. |
| JEL: | I10 J01 J12 |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35387 |
| By: | Brad Hershbein; Katherine Lim; Douglas Webber; Mike Zabek |
| Abstract: | We examine how labor market tightness affects workers' job amenities and quality. Using novel data from the Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED), and multiple measures of labor market tightness, we estimate that a 10 percent increase in job vacancies per thousand residents leads to a 7-12 percent increase in the probability of changing jobs, an 11-18 percent increase in the (unconditional) probability of switching to a self-assessed overall better job, and similar-size increases in pay and benefits, interest in the work, and better opportunities for advancement. Tight labor markets thus not only improve worker pay, in line with earlier studies, but also improve job amenities more broadly, and by roughly the same proportion. Consequently, the benefits to workers of a tight labor market are likely underestimated when based on pay alone. |
| Keywords: | job quality, labor market tightness, shed, jolts, Lightcast, local shocks |
| JEL: | J23 J28 J32 J62 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12762 |
| By: | Paul Bingley; Lorenzo Cappellari; Konstantinos Tatsiramos |
| Abstract: | We study how assortative mating shapes the composition of education–outcome gradients and how these gradients relate to intergenerational transmission. Using Danish administrative data on family quartets, we decompose own gradients in long-run earnings, disposable income, assets, and wealth into jointly transmitted parental factors, parent-specific transmission, nonparental shared influences, and individual-specific heterogeneity. Earnings and income gradients mainly reflect jointly transmitted parental factors and individual-specific heterogeneity; assets and especially wealth mainly reflect parent-specific transmission. Comparing families facing different parental access to middle schools, we show that the composition of financial gradients varies by educational opportunity, while labor market gradients are largely invariant. |
| Keywords: | assortative mating, education gradients, Intergenerational mobility |
| JEL: | J62 D31 J12 I24 E21 J24 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12763 |
| By: | António Dias da Silva; Marco Weißler |
| Abstract: | While employer-to-employer (E2E) transitions are by now well-documented, these data alone cannot reveal what drives mobility: who searches, why, and how search translates into transitions. Using novel panel data from the ECB and NY Fed consumer expectations surveys, we provide the first systematic cross-country analysis of on-the job search (OJS) and E2E transitions across eleven euro area countries and the U.S. Our data uniquely include direct measures of OJS and its motives (job loss expectations for precautionary, pay satisfaction for job ladder) for all workers, not just searchers. We find that OJS is widespread, making employed workers the majority of searchers, and it strongly predicts E2E transitions. Motives differ dramatically: precautionary search dominates in Europe, while the job ladder motive dominates in the U.S. OJS is highly persistent, with 40% continuing to search even after starting a new job. |
| Keywords: | job search; expectations; labor market transitions |
| JEL: | J64 D84 |
| Date: | 2026–06–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedlwp:103531 |
| By: | Paul Gregg (Department of Social & Policy Sciences, University of Bath); Yuyan Jiang (UCL Social Research Institute); Lindsey Macmillan (UCL Centre for Education Policy & Equalising Opportunities); Nikki Shure (UCL Social Research Institute); Gill Wyness (UCL Centre for Education Policy & Equalising Opportunities) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides new evidence on intergenerational income persistence for a recent UK cohort. Using Next Steps, a longitudinal study of people born in England in 1989-90 linked to administrative education records, we estimate the association between parental income in adolescence and sons' earnings at age 32, compare the results with the 1970 British Cohort Study, and decompose persistence by early cognitive skills, noncognitive traits and educational attainment. Our preferred estimates show an intergenerational income elasticity of 0.214 and a rank-rank coefficient of 0.287. The rank-rank estimate is almost identical to the comparable estimate for the 1970 cohort, suggesting little change in relative income persistence across cohorts, although age-32 elasticities are likely to understate lifetime persistence. Education is the main observed mechanism: GCSE attainment, A-level attainment and degree completion account for a substantial share of persistence, while measured noncognitive traits explain little once education is included. The findings show that, despite educational expansion, family-income gradients in attainment remain central to the intergenerational transmission of economic advantage. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational income mobility, socioeconomic inequality, education, skills |
| JEL: | I24 J62 J13 J31 |
| Date: | 2026–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucl:cepeow:26-06 |
| By: | Joan Costa-i-Font; Wanying Wang |
| Abstract: | Although flexible employment policies can help employed individuals balance caregiving and paid work, limited evidence has been devoted to examining the effect of working flexibly on the supply of care to older adults. In this paper, we study the impact of flexible working conditions on the supply of informal adult care and mental health. We exploit variation from the 2014 expansion of the Right to Request Flexible Work (RRFW) to employees in the UK. Our findings point to a gendered response to increased employment flexibility. We document a 1.3-percentage-point increase in the likelihood that men provide informal care within the household, alongside less regular daytime work, greater control over working hours, and higher engagement in home production. In contrast, among potential female caregivers, we find that the reform reduced the probability of high-intensity caregiving, which is typically incompatible with employment or related activities. We document that the increased workplace flexibility not only encourages caregiving but also helps reduce gender disparities in unpaid care. We additionally find suggestive evidence of improved mental health outcomes, particularly among men. |
| Keywords: | flexible working, informal care, right to request flexible work, mental health, United Kingdom |
| JEL: | J14 J22 I13 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12825 |
| By: | Daniel K. Fetter; Lee M. Lockwood; Paul Mohnen |
| Abstract: | Both historically and today, support of aging parents has largely taken the form of in-kind transfers that require physical proximity, such as housing and caregiving. If Social Security substitutes for such support, it can relax constraints on where recipients' children live and work. We investigate the long-run intergenerational effects of the early Social Security program, exploiting within-occupation, cross-industry differences in coverage and a new dataset linking parents to their children's later-life outcomes. We find that sons whose parents had greater predicted coverage moved farther from their childhood homes, earned more, and lived in better neighborhoods late in life. We find no such effects for daughters, who tended to provide forms of support less easily replaced by Social Security. The gains considerably exceeded the associated Social Security benefits for the average family, with migration to better-matched labor markets a likely key driver. We propose that the early program enabled families to realize gains from migration that were back-loaded, uncertain, and difficult to contract on. |
| JEL: | D15 H55 J14 J61 N32 R23 |
| Date: | 2026–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35456 |
| By: | Böhme, Fabian |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the labor supply effects of unconditional cash transfers aimed at young families, using the Bavarian Family Allowance (Familiengeld ), introduced in 2018. The policy provides € 250-300 monthly to families with children aged 13-36 months regardless of employment status or childcare use. Combining difference-in-differences estimates from two complementary panel datasets, I find no statistically significant effect on maternal employment: the pooled estimate is a small and imprecise +4.2 percentage points (95% CI [-1.8, +10.2]). Because Bavaria is the only treated state, I complement the difference-in-differences with randomization inference over placebo states and a synthetic difference-in-differences design that matches Bavaria's pre-policy trajectory; both confirm that Bavaria's estimate falls within the normal range of untreated states, and the specifications that most directly address an imperfect pre-trend-individual fixed effects and the synthetic estimator-center on zero. A triple-difference specification points to a larger positive response among single and low-income mothers, but this pattern does not survive randomization inference and is best read as suggestive. Given that the unconditional design generates only a modest income effect without altering the relative price of employment, the evidence does not support concerns that transfers of this size meaningfully reduce maternal labor supply, nor does it establish a positive activation effect. |
| Keywords: | Family policy, maternal labor supply, cash transfers, difference-in-differences, heterogeneous treatment effects |
| JEL: | J13 J22 H31 I38 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:iwqwdp:341986 |
| By: | Pawel Adrjan; Mária Balgova; Simon Jäger; Jonas Jessen; Jason Sockin |
| Abstract: | Discrete choice experiments are widely used to estimate workers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for job amenities under the assumption that varying an attribute does not change workers’ beliefs about other job attributes. We test this assumption by embedding an amenity with a known market price—a popular monthly public transport pass—in a largescale discrete choice experiment with German workers. Many workers, including public transport users, overvalue the ticket by more than 100%, despite WTP for other attributes aligning with the literature. A complementary belief-elicitation experiment shows that advertising an amenity, such as the pass but also common amenities like work from home, causally shifts beliefs about unlisted attributes of the job. Posted wages similarly signal unlisted attributes so that wage variation, the money metric for WTP calculation, is itself contaminated by belief spillovers—such as higher pay signaling heightened stress. These spillovers imply that discrete choice estimates capture perceived bundles rather than isolated attributes, and distort current estimates of non-wage compensation and monopsony power. |
| JEL: | C25 C83 D83 D84 D91 J0 J31 J32 J42 J64 |
| Date: | 2026–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35457 |
| By: | Fabian Kindermann; Carla Krolage; Sebastian Kunz; Manuel Pannier; Karoline Ströhlein |
| Abstract: | This paper provides causal evidence on how pension income affects labor supply after retirement. We exploit the introduction of the German Earned Income Pension Credit (Grundrente), which permanently increased pension income for retirees with long contribution histories and comparatively low lifetime earnings. The reform generates exogenous variation in non-labor income without creating additional labor supply distortions, allowing us to isolate pure income effects. Using administrative data covering the universe of German retirees and a difference-in-differences design, we find that a 1, 200 euro increase in annual pension income reduces unconditional labor earnings by approximately 122 euros, implying a marginal propensity to earn out of unearned income of −0.1. Two thirds of this response reflects extensive margin adjustments, which operate through both increased exit and reduced re-entry, with the remainder driven by intensive margin reductions. Effects are stronger for younger, more labor-market-attached cohorts. |
| Keywords: | post-retirement labor supply, pension income, income effects, older workers, pension reform, Grundrente, labor force participation, administrative data |
| JEL: | H31 H55 J14 J22 J26 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12757 |