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on Labour Economics |
| By: | Sébastien Fontenay; Libertad González |
| Abstract: | We estimate the long-term impact of early paternal involvement by exploiting the 2002 Belgian paternity leave introduction as a natural experiment. Using a regression discontinuity design, we find that the reform significantly increased fathers' long-term time investment in childcare. Tracking children into early adulthood, we find precisely estimated null effects on a comprehensive set of outcomes, including educational attainment, labor market attachment, and family formation. These results hold across subgroups, including children of low and high- educated fathers. We conclude that while paternity leave may increase father involvement, it does not generate detectable advantages (or disadvantages) in children's early adult lives. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational effects, paternity leave |
| JEL: | J08 J13 J16 J18 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1542 |
| By: | Mueser, Peter; Michaelides, Marios (Actus Policy Research); Poe-Yamagata, Eileen; Jeon, Kyung-Seong |
| Abstract: | The Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) program is a job-search assistance intervention targeting Unemployment Insurance (UI) claimants in the United States. The program requires new UI claimants to attend a counseling session at the start of their UI claims to: 1) undergo an eligibility review to confirm their compliance with UI work search requirements, and 2) receive customized reemployment services. This study reports the results of a large-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT) of the Missouri RESEA program conducted in 2023, a period of strong labor market conditions. Results show that the program increased take-up of job counseling services and significantly reduced UI duration and benefit amounts collected, generating substantial savings for the UI system. Further, the program caused significant improvements in participants’ employment and earnings in the three quarters following UI entry. |
| Date: | 2025–11–29 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:spfa6_v1 |
| By: | Alireza Sepahsalari; Cristiano Mantovani; Ana Figueiredo; Isaac Baley |
| Abstract: | We study how wealth shapes workers' outcomes in turbulent labor markets, where job displacement exposes workers to the risk of skill loss. We develop and quantify a heterogeneous-agent directed search model with incomplete markets, skill dynamics, and job "tiers" with distinct risk–return profiles. Workers self-insure against separation and turbulence risks through savings and search decisions, both within and across tiers, generating post-separation outcomes that vary sharply with wealth. In U.S. data, poor workers face the most significant and most persistent wage losses, driven by wealth-induced downgrades into low-tier jobs. Policy experiments reveal clear trade-offs: unemployment insurance improves welfare, while job-creation subsidies more effectively expand output. |
| Keywords: | directed search, job displacement, job tiers, job-creation subsidies, precautionary savings, precautionary search, self-insurance, Skill loss, turbulence riks, Unemployment Insurance |
| JEL: | D31 E21 E24 J24 J31 J63 J64 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1538 |
| By: | Xinyue Li (Harvard University); Armando Miano (University of Naples Federico II, CSEF, and CEPR); Sophia Mo (Harvard University) |
| Abstract: | We investigate how coworkers shape job mobility decisions by influencing workersÕ perceptions of their outside options. Using novel survey data from a representative sample of U.S. wage and salaried workers, we identify two distinct channels through which current and former coworkers affect mobility. First, having more current coworkers with prior experience in an industry enhances both the accuracy of workersÕ wage beliefs and their perceived probability of receiving a job offer from that industry. Second, having more past coworkers currently employed in a sector raises the perceived likelihood of receiving an offer from that sector. At the firm level, personal connections increase the perceived probability of receiving an offer from that specific firm, as shown in a survey experiment eliciting subjective job-offer probabilities. We incorporate these findings into a job choice model featuring coworker-based learning and referral effects. Relative to standard models that assume perfect information about wages and job opportunities, our framework demonstrates that coworker networks facilitate labor reallocation and mitigate the welfare losses associated with information frictions. |
| Keywords: | Job Mobility, Job Search, Coworker Networks, Industries, Survey, Subjective Expectations. |
| JEL: | J01 J62 D91 D83 E71 |
| Date: | 2025–12–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sef:csefwp:768 |
| By: | Chiaf, Elisa; Corsini, Alberto; Miniaci, Raffaele; Urgilés Salinas, María Paz |
| Abstract: | Unemployment and limited access to decent job opportunities disproportionately affect individuals facing various forms of vulnerability. In Italy, policies designed to promote the participation of this disadvantaged labour force grant Work Integration Social Cooperatives (WISC) tax benefits and contribution revenues. In return, WISCs employing disadvantaged individuals generate public finance savings by lowering publicly funded health care and social assistance expenditures, while also creating value added through increased VAT revenues. This paper investigates whether the net balance for public finances of such labour policies is negative or positive. We employ a monetary cost-benefit analysis of 6, 892 job placements facilitated by social cooperatives in Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna, and Veneto between 2014 and 2023. Specifically, we use VALORIS, an evaluation approach that assesses the financial sustainability of every single job placement of disadvantaged workers, and apply it to 92 WISCs followed between 2014 and 2023. Our results indicate that the Italian active labour policy of work integration of disadvantaged workers in social cooperatives is self-financing. Moreover, we find heterogeneity in the costs and benefits associated with different types of disadvantages. Finally, we highlight the relevance of the job placement of workers who are signalled as vulnerable by social services, but who do not receive incentives for their hiring, in producing positive effects on the public budget. |
| Keywords: | Work Integration Social Enterprises, Active labour market policy, Disadvantaged workers, Policy evaluation |
| JEL: | J68 P13 H43 J14 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esprep:333976 |
| By: | Sen Coskun; Husnu Dalgic; Yasemin Ozdemir |
| Abstract: | Women strategically sort into "family-friendly" sectors characterized by lower returns to experience but also lower per-child penalties, before the birth of their first child. This pre-birth sorting represents an ex-ante career cost, a "sorting penalty" not captured by conventional measures. We build a heterogeneous agent model of career choice and fertility, incorporating both quality-quantity (Q-Q) and time-expenditure (T-E) trade-offs, to quantify this cost. Our central finding is that despite this sorting penalty being surprisingly small, it reveals an important mechanism: Women at the productivity margin are the switchers and use the Q-Q and T-E trade-offs as their primary, more powerful tools to navigate motherhood and career. Our findings highlight that frameworks excluding these trade-offs will overestimate the fertility responses and career costs associated with policies. |
| Keywords: | child penalty, fertility, sectoral gender segregation, job switch, quality-quantity trade-off |
| JEL: | E24 J13 J22 J24 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_722 |
| By: | Claude Diebolt; Joel Huesler |
| Abstract: | In 1685, Louis XIV’s revocation of the Edict of Nantes expelled some 200, 000 Huguenots—one of the most skill-selective forced migrations in early modern Europe. While their contributions to England, Prussia and the Dutch Republic are well documented, the economic losses borne by the French regions they left behind have remained surprisingly unmeasured, despite the Huguenots’ disproportionate role in textiles, luxury crafts, finance and international trade. This paper provides the first economy-wide, micro-quantitative estimate of the long-run cost of this exodus for France. Using a newly assembled parish-level panel of Protestant baptism registers (1570–1700) linked to the industrial censuses of 1839 and 1860, we trace how a seventeenth-century demographic shock shaped regional development nearly two centuries later. We uncover three core results. (1) A one-standard-deviation decline in Huguenot baptisms (≈–20%) led to enduring losses:–5.8% industrial employment, –4.4% establishments and–5.1% wages in 1839, with output deficits still visible in 1860. (2) These effects persisted remarkably: by 1860, industrial production remained 2.8% lower—about 480, 000 francs per arrondissement. (3) The impact hinged on institutional and intellectual complementarities: regions distant from universities, printing presses, commercial hubs or Parliaments suffered the deepest scars. Together, these findings show how the removal of a highly skilled minority durably reshaped France’s economic geography, leaving an imprint that lasted for nearly two centuries. |
| Keywords: | Huguenots; Forced migration; Human capital; Economic persistence; Industrialization; Regional development; Historical shocks; Microhistorical data; Skill-selective migration. |
| JEL: | N33 N34 J61 O15 R11 F22 C23 N93 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ulp:sbbeta:2025-48 |
| By: | Daniel Bianchi (Universidad de La Laguna); Ã lvaro Choi (Universitat de Barcelona); John Jerrim (University College London) |
| Abstract: | Early gender gaps condition future educational decisions and labor market and social outcomes. There is extensive evidence reporting the existence of significant gender gaps in mathematical and scientific competencies at age 15. It has been suggested these patterns may explain why men tend to make a clean sweep on STEM careers. This has led to a debate on which factors may be driving gender gaps in educational outcomes. While some authors point to the existence of differences in psychological traits by gender, others focus on external factors, such as socioeconomic characteristics, parental values and educational trajectories. Another factor which is sometimes claimed to be a relevant determinant of the gender gap in performance are socially determined gender roles. Evidence on this last point has been however rarely tested. In this paper we shed light on this issue. We do so by exploring the relationship between the use of leisure time in science-related activities at early ages and the emergence of gender gaps in performance and career expectations at age 15. We take advantage of intra and across country variation for a set of countries. Results show that game patterns at early ages are decisive for explaining gender gaps in performance. Boys have a higher likelihood of playing brick games when they are at preschool, as well as several science related activities at age 10. More time spent in science-related leisure activities influences performance in grade 4 and at age 15, and, in turn, STEM expectations. In this sense, childhood play patterns contribute to explaining gender gaps in mathematics and science achievement, as well as in STEM expectations. Gender-differentiated play dynamics from an early age can explain the widening of gender gaps several grades later. These results contribute to identifying how certain play practices and leisure activities in childhood may eventually bias mathematics and science achievement and preferences between girls and boys. The implications for an education policy committed to equal educational opportunities are discussed. |
| Keywords: | STEM, gender gap, game, academic performance |
| JEL: | I24 J16 J24 I21 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ewp:wpaper:491web |
| By: | Carin van der Cruijsen; Dörthe Kunkel; Rick Nijkamp |
| Abstract: | This study highlights the multifaceted nature of household payment task division, revealing that a broad spectrum of factors contributes to who takes the lead in executing household payments. The allocation of specific payment tasks is related to partners’ differences in personality traits, enjoyment of payment tasks and available time. Disparities in income and assets also play a significant role, alongside differences in payment knowledge, digital payment experience, and money management skills. Furthermore, individuals tend to replicate the division of payment tasks observed in others. Traditional patterns whereby men manage housing-related payments and women handle grocery expenses, appear across all generations but are most prevalent among the oldest. Greater involvement in household payment tasks is associated with increased financial influence within the household. It also facilitates the ability to take over a partner’s payment responsibilities when needed and enhances early awareness of potential financial issues. In a substantial number of households, one partner is solely responsible for managing specific payments. Strong payment knowledge, digital payment experience, and staying informed about the partner’s payment activities support a smooth transition of responsibilities when necessary. |
| Keywords: | household payments; division of tasks; financial inclusion; gender gap; financial decisions; |
| JEL: | D12 D83 J16 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dnb:dnbwpp:851 |
| By: | Viet Lien Le (Development and Policies Research Center (DEPOCEN), Suite 305 - 307, 12 Trang Thi Street, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi); Tu Anh Bui (Development and Policies Research Center (DEPOCEN), Suite 305 - 307, 12 Trang Thi Street, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi); Anh Ngoc Nguyen (Development and Policies Research Center (DEPOCEN), Suite 305 - 307, 12 Trang Thi Street, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi); Ngoc-Minh Nguyen (Development and Policies Research Center (DEPOCEN), Suite 305 - 307, 12 Trang Thi Street, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi) |
| Abstract: | This paper develops and tests a Nash bargaining model of household labor allocation. The model explains how spouses allocate their time to housework by maximizing joint utility while accounting for outside options such as income opportunities. In this framework, the spouse contributing more earnings gains stronger bargaining power and can negotiate a smaller share of housework. Using Vietnamese panel data from 2018 and 2020, we estimate a Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) system to examine how relative income influences household labor division. The results show that women with higher relative income reduce their housework time. Moreover, relative income affects the reallocation between spouses: husbands increase their contribution to domestic tasks while wives reduce theirs. For specific activities, relative income decreases wives’ time on both pure household chores and caregiving. Our findings contribute to the literature by providing evidence from a developing Asian country and underscore the importance of women’s economic empowerment in promoting gender equality in unpaid work. |
| Keywords: | Household decisions, Nash, |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dpc:wpaper:0196 |
| By: | Melanie Borah; Susanne Elsas |
| Abstract: | Analyses of income distributions across households crucially depend on equivalence scales. They define income increments necessary to keep a household’s living standard constant as it is joined by additional adults or children. Such scales have frequently been estimated using income satisfaction data, yet under the assumption that household income, size, and structure are exogenous. The present paper is the first to relax this assumption and consider the possible endogeneity of income and family size in income satisfaction. This involves an empirical analysis of data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) using fixed-effects regressions with heteroscedasticity-based instruments. Our results confirm that endogeneity is relevant in regressions of income satisfaction; equivalence weights, however, appear not to be biased significantly. Accounting for endogeneity in income and family size has virtually no implications for distribution and poverty analyses. |
| Keywords: | equivalence scale, income satisfaction, endogeneity, internal instruments |
| JEL: | I32 J13 D31 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp1234 |
| By: | Slonimczyk, Fabian |
| Abstract: | I propose a relatively simple way to deploy pre-trained large language models (LLMs) in order to extract sentiment and other useful features from text data. The method, which I refer to as prompt-based sentiment extraction, offers multiple advantages over other methods used in economics and finance. In particular, it accepts the text input as is (without preprocessing) and produces a sentiment score that has a probability interpretation. Unlike other LLM-based approaches, it does not require any fine-tuning or labeled data. I apply my prompt-based strategy to a hand-collected corpus of confidential reference letters (RLs). I show that the sentiment contents of RLs are clearly reflected in job market outcomes. Candidates with higher average sentiment in their RLs perform markedly better regardless of the measure of success chosen. Moreover, I show that sentiment dispersion among letter writers negatively affects the job market candidate’s performance. I compare my sentiment extraction approach to other commonly used methods for sentiment analysis: ‘bag-of-words’ approaches, fine-tuned language models, and querying advanced chatbots. No other method can fully reproduce the results obtained by prompt-based sentiment extraction. Finally, I slightly modify the method to obtain ‘gendered’ sentiment scores (as in Eberhardt et al., 2023). I show that RLs written for female candidates emphasize ‘grindstone’ personality traits, whereas male candidates’ letters emphasize ‘standout’ traits. These gender differences negatively affect women’s job market outcomes. |
| Keywords: | Large language models; text data; sentiment analysis; reference letters |
| JEL: | C45 J16 M51 |
| Date: | 2025–10 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:126675 |
| By: | Rodríguez-Clare, Andrés; Ulate, Mauricio; Vasquez, Jose |
| Abstract: | We present a dynamic quantitative trade and migration model that incorporates downward nominal wage rigidities and show how this framework can generate changes in unemployment and labor participation that match those uncovered by the empirical literature studying the “China shock.” We find that the China shock leads to average welfare increases in most U.S. states, including many that experience unemployment during the transition. However, nominal rigidities reduce the overall U.S. gains by around two thirds. In addition, there are 18 states that experience welfare losses in the presence of downward nominal wage rigidity that would have experienced gains without it. |
| JEL: | R14 J01 J1 |
| Date: | 2025–11–26 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:127629 |
| By: | Theunissen, Anne; Lordan, Grace |
| Abstract: | RISE is an action-based framework to accelerate the progress of women in Capital Markets in Canada. Based on interviews with women in income-generating positions in various Capital Markets organisations, it highlights the advances that have been made in the sector, and outlines the biases, norms and barriers that still hold women back. To generate real change in the industry, it includes selected actions that individuals, managers, and firms can take to progress women in Capital Markets. Based on empirical data and behavioural science research, RISE highlights four ways to promote inclusion: 1) changing notions of competence, 2) inspiring accountable leadership, 3) stop fixing and starting to include women, and 4) embracing a new vision of the ideal worker. |
| JEL: | R14 J01 |
| Date: | 2025–04–16 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:130346 |
| By: | Kikuchi, Tatsuru |
| Abstract: | This paper tests whether demographic aging shocks propagate across Japanese municipalities through spatial and economic network channels. Using quarterly panel data on 4, 547 municipalities from 2018 to 2024, I apply the spatial treatment effect framework from \citet{kikuchi2024dynamical} and \citet{kikuchi2024stochastic}, extended with a Lévy–Brownian process \footnote{A temporal jump-diffusion process combining continuous Brownian motion with Lévy jumps.} to capture discontinuous crisis events alongside continuous evolution. The central finding contradicts conventional assumptions: aging shocks remain strictly localized with zero spillovers despite connected infrastructure and dense networks. Five analyses establish this result. Perturbative decomposition shows 99.82 percent of variation explained by direct effects. Treatment effect estimates (ATT=0.355pp, ATE=0.541pp) exclude spillover components. General equilibrium multipliers of 1.04 indicate minimal amplification. Stochastic uncertainty quantification reveals that while Lévy jumps raise crisis probability from 3 to 12 percent, tail risk remains localized. Temporal trends document increasing regional isolation. The absence of spillovers reflects fundamental isolation: Tokyo concentration, infrastructure decay, service withdrawal, and economic hollowing transform Japan's spatial structure from integrated to fragmented. Regional coordination policies are ineffective; local interventions are sufficient. |
| Keywords: | Population aging, demographic spillovers, regional isolation, spatial econometrics, Levy processes, Japan |
| JEL: | C14 C21 C31 C51 J11 R23 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:126742 |
| By: | Pang, Nicholas A. |
| Abstract: | Chapter XIII's wage-earner payment plans are now the default form of personal bankruptcy in the USA. During the Great Depression, it was created as a voluntary choice and enacted with unanimous legislative support. Absent conflict between creditors and labor and social reformers, legislators agreed that Chapter XIII was for the benefit of both honorable insolvents and their fair creditors. How did wage-earner payment plans emerge out of a consensual legislative process? Employing a computational abductive approach on a wide range of legislative, media and bankruptcy records, I show that Chapter XIII's creation was facilitated by a 'moral accounting' that, based on their race and gender identities, positively evaluated most White men bankruptcy petitioners as 'deserving', even as it recognized occupational variations in their economic 'productivity'. This study highlights how racial discourses of 'deservingness' are central to the construction of credit markets as part of America's submerged welfare state. |
| Keywords: | borrowing; Canada: 1913; credit & debt; debt; and wealth; historical sociology; law; moral norms; stratification; AAM requested |
| JEL: | N0 J1 |
| Date: | 2025–01–31 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:129981 |
| By: | Takumi Toyono (Waseda Institute of Social & Human Capital Studies (WISH), Waseda University); Haruko Noguchi (Faculty of Political Science and Economics, Waseda University; WISH;) |
| Abstract: | As natural disasters increase in frequency and severity globally and populations age rapidly, understanding how disasters affect informal care systems becomes critical for policy design in aging societies. This study examines the causal impact of disaster exposure on informal caregiving burdens and caregiver health, exploiting spatial variation in seismic intensity from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. Using difference-in-differences estimation applied to unique longitudinal survey data linked to administrative records, we provide the first empirical evidence distinguishing impacts across the intensive margin (existing caregivers) and extensive margin (new caregivers) — a theoretically important distinction grounded in household production theory that prior disaster-caregiving research has overlooked. We find that a 12 percentage point increase in the proportion of destroyed or damaged houses increases weekly care time by 8.5 hours (45.9% increase) among existing caregivers and raises care provision likelihood by 2.3 percentage points (19.5% increase) among new caregivers. Mental health deteriorates exclusively among new caregivers, with effects concentrated among female and less-educated caregivers. Two key mechanisms drive these effects: disrupted formal at-home care services, with an estimated elasticity of informal-to-formal care substitution near unity, and reduced employment among new caregivers. Our findings reveal substantial hidden welfare costs beyond standard disaster impact assessments and demonstrate that optimal policy responses must account for fundamental differences in household adjustment mechanisms across margins. The results have broad relevance for disaster preparedness planning in aging economies worldwide. |
| Keywords: | natural disaster, informal caregiving, caregiver health, intensive and extensive margins, long-term care |
| JEL: | I10 J14 Q54 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wap:wpaper:2528 |