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on Labor Markets - Supply, Demand, and Wages |
| By: | Olivier Marie (Erasmus University Rotterdam); Judit Vall Castello (University of Barcelona) |
| Abstract: | We investigate the impact on work absence of a massive reduction in paid sick leave benefits. We exploit a policy change that only affected public sector workers in Spain and compare changes in the number and length of spells they take relative to unaffected private sector workers. Our results highlight a large drop in frequency mostly offset by increases in average duration. Overall, the policy did reduce number of days lost to sick leave. For some, however, return to work may have been premature as we document huge increases in both the proportion of relapses and working accidents rates. |
| Keywords: | Sickness Insurance, Paid Sick Leave, Absenteeism, Presenteeism, Relapses Contagious Diseases, Benefit Displacement, Working Accidents, Negative Externalities, Spain |
| JEL: | J32 I12 I13 I18 J22 J28 |
| Date: | 2020–06–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tin:wpaper:20200032&r=all |
| By: | Adams-Prassl, Abigail (University of Oxford); Boneva, Teodora (University of Zurich); Golin, Marta (University of Oxford); Rauh, Christopher (University of Montreal) |
| Abstract: | Using large, geographically representative surveys from the US and UK, we document variation in the percentage of tasks workers can do from home. We highlight three dimensions of heterogeneity that have previously been neglected. First, the share of tasks that can be done from home varies considerably both across as well as within occupations and industries. The distribution of the share of tasks that can be done from home within occupations, industries, and occupation-industry pairs is systematic and remarkably consistent across countries and survey waves. Second, as the pandemic has progressed, the share of workers who can do all tasks from home has increased most in those occupations in which the pre-existing share was already high. Third, even within occupations and industries, we find that women can do fewer tasks from home. Using machine-learning methods, we extend our working-from-home measure to all disaggregated occupation-industry pairs. The measure we present in this paper is a critical input for models considering the possibility to work from home, including models used to assess the impact of the pandemic or design policies targeted at reopening the economy. |
| Keywords: | working from home, occupations, industry, Coronavirus, COVID-19, telework |
| JEL: | J21 J24 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13374&r=all |
| By: | Ransom, Tyler (University of Oklahoma) |
| Abstract: | I examine the extent to which the returns to college majors are influenced by selective migration and occupational choice across locations in the US. To quantify the role of selection, I develop and estimate an extended Roy model of migration, occupational choice, and earnings where, upon completing their education, individuals choose a location in which to live and an occupation in which to work. In order to estimate this high-dimensional choice model, I make use of machine learning methods that allow for model selection and estimation simultaneously in a non-parametric setting. I find that OLS estimates of the returns to business and STEM majors relative to education majors are biased upward by 15% on average. Using estimates of the model, I characterize the migration behavior of different college majors and find that migration flows are twice as sensitive to occupational concentration as they are towage returns. |
| Keywords: | college major, migration, occupation, Roy model |
| JEL: | I2 J3 R1 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13370&r=all |
| By: | Abhijit Banerjee; Dean Karlan; Hannah Trachtman; Christopher R. Udry |
| Abstract: | The income elasticity of labor supply is a central parameter of many economic models. We test how labor supply and effort in northern Ghana respond to exogenous changes in income and wages using a randomized evaluation of a multi-faceted grant program combined with a bag-making operation. We find that recipients of the grant program increase, rather than reduce, their supply of labor. We argue that simple models with either labor or capital market frictions are not sufficient to explain the results, whereas a model that allows for a positive psychological productivity effect from higher income does fit our findings. |
| JEL: | H31 J22 O12 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27314&r=all |
| By: | Westphal, Matthias (TU Dortmund); Kamhöfer, Daniel A. (Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE)); Schmitz, Hendrik (RWI) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we identify female long-term wage returns to college education using the educational expansion between 1960–1990 in West Germany as exogenous variation for college enrollment. We estimate marginal treatment effects to learn about the underlying behavioral structure of women who decide for or against going to college (e.g., whether there is selection into gains). We propose a simple partial identification technique using an adjusted version of the Lee bounds to account for women who select into employment due to having a college education, which we call college-induced selection into employment (CISE). We find that women are, on average, more than 17 percentage points more likely to be employed due to having a college education than without. Taking this CISE into account, we find wage returns of 6–12 percent per year of education completed (average treatment effects on the treated). |
| Keywords: | marginal treatment effect, partial identification, returns to higher education, female labor force participation |
| JEL: | C31 I26 J24 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13382&r=all |
| By: | Theodore Papageorgiou (Boston College) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, I document that workers in larger cities have significantly more occupational options than workers in smaller ones. They are able to form better occupational matches and earn higher wages. I also note differences in the occupational reallocation patterns across cities. I develop a dynamic model of occupational choice that microfounds agglomeration economies and captures the empirical patterns. The calibration of the model suggests that better occupational match quality accounts for approximately 35% of the observed wage premium and a third of the greater inequality in larger cities. |
| Keywords: | Occupations, Agglomeration Economies, Urban Wage Premium, Multi-armed Bandits, Geographical Mobility, Matching Theory, Wage Inequality, Job Vacancy Postings |
| JEL: | J24 J31 R23 |
| Date: | 2020–06–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:boc:bocoec:1011&r=all |
| By: | Christian Belzil (Paris Polytechnic Institute, CIRANO and IZA); Jorgen Hansen (Concordia University, CIRANO, CIREQ and IZA) |
| Abstract: | We estimate a structural dynamic Roy model of education, labor supply and earnings on the 1979 and 1997 cohorts of males taken from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) and evaluate to what extent changes in education and labor supply decisions across cohorts have been explained by changes in i) the college premium, ii) the utility of attending higher education, iii) grade progression standards, and iv) the value of non-market time. We quantify the evolution of the relative and absolute qualities of both college graduates and college attendants (associates). We find that it is impossible to rationalize changes in observed schooling decisions without appealing to a large increase in intrinsic taste for education, despite a doubling of the cost of college and its impact on debt-load. The population distribution of the college premium has shifted to the right, going from 50% to 58%, while the premium of actual college graduates has shifted to the left, going from 72% to 54%, thereby pointing toward a reduction of the relative quality of college graduates. The absolute quality (human capital) of college graduates has however remained stable. For college attendants (associates),both relative and absolute quality dropped. One implication of the relative flattening of age earnings profiles is the removal of the negative effect of late college graduation on early life-cycle wages. Our estimates indicate it moved from a 4% penalty per year of delay to an insignificant quantity by the early 2000’s. |
| Keywords: | Wage Inequality, Educational Selectivity, Wage Distribu-tion, College Premium, Dynamic Discrete Choice. |
| JEL: | I2 J1 J3 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crd:wpaper:20005&r=all |
| By: | Jerzmanowski, Michal; Tamura, Robert |
| Abstract: | We estimate the elasticity of substitution between high-skill and low-skill workers using panel data from 32 countries during 1970-2015. Most existing estimates, which are based only on U.S. micro data, find a value close to 1.6. We bring international data together with a theory-informed macro approach to provide new evidence on this important macroeconomic parameter. Using the macro approach we find that the elasticity of substitution between tertiary-educated workers and those with lower education levels falls between 1.8 and 2.6, which is higher than previous estimates but within a plausible range. In some specifications, estimated elasticity is above the value required for strong skill-bias of technology, suggesting strong skill-bias is not implausible. |
| Keywords: | elasticity of substitution, high-skill labor, low-skill labor, skill premium, strong skill-bias, endogenous directed technology |
| JEL: | E24 E25 J31 O11 |
| Date: | 2020–05–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:100768&r=all |
| By: | Murillo Campello; Gaurav Kankanhalli; Pradeep Muthukrishnan |
| Abstract: | Big data on job-vacancy postings reveal several dimensions of the impact of COVID-19 on the U.S. job market. Firms have cut back on postings for high-skill jobs more than for low-skill jobs, with small firms nearly halting their new hiring altogether. New-hiring cuts and downskilling are most pronounced in local labor markets lacking depth (where employment is concentrated within a few firms), in low-income areas, and in areas with greater income inequality. Cuts are deeper in industries where workers are more unionized and in the non-tradable sector. Access to finance modulates corporate hiring, with credit-constrained firms curtailing their job postings the most. Our study shows how the early-2020 global pandemic is shaping the dynamics of hiring, identifying the firms, jobs, places, industries, and labor markets most affected by it. Our results point to important challenges to the scale and speed of a recovery. |
| JEL: | E24 G31 J23 |
| Date: | 2020–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27208&r=all |
| By: | Baum, Christopher F.; Lööf, Hans; Stephan, Andreas; Zimmermann, Klaus F. |
| Abstract: | Refugee workers start low and adjust slowly to the wages of comparable natives. The innovative approach in this study using unique Swedish employeremployee data shows that the observed wage gap between established refugees and comparable natives is mainly caused by occupational sorting into cognitive and manual tasks. Within occupations, it can be largely explained by differences in work experience. The identification strategy relies on a control group of matched natives with the same characteristics as the refugees, using panel data for 2003–2013 to capture unobserved heterogeneity. |
| Keywords: | refugees,wage earnings gap,Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition,employer-employee data,coarsened exact matching,correlated random effects model |
| JEL: | C23 F22 J24 J6 O15 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:562&r=all |
| By: | Christian Eggenberger; Uschi Backes-Gellner |
| Abstract: | This paper examines how workers' earnings change after involuntary job separations depending on the workers' acquired IT skills and the specificity of their occupational training. We expect that IT skills can have opposing effects depending on their type. They can reduce or amplify earnings losses of workers with specific occupational skill bundles. We use information on all skills that workers acquire during their occupational training and categorize them along two independent dimensions. On one hand, we categorize IT skills into (a) generic IT skills useful in any context (e.g., online research) and expert IT skills (e.g., specific programming languages). On the other hand, we look at all skills of an occupation and distinguish between skill bundles that are more specific or less specific compared to the skill bundles that are needed in the overall labor market. We find clearly opposing correlations for IT skills in specific occupations: generic IT skills are positively correlated with earnings after involuntary separations, expert IT are negatively correlated with earnings after involuntary separations for workers in specific occupations. |
| Keywords: | IT Skills, human capital specificity, vocational education and training |
| JEL: | J24 J63 M53 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iso:educat:0172&r=all |
| By: | Matthias Doepke; Ruben Gaetani |
| Abstract: | Why has the college wage premium risen rapidly in the United States since the 1980s, but not in European economies such as Germany? We argue that differences in employment protection can account for much of the gap. We develop a model where firms and workers make relationship-specific investments in skill accumulation. The incentive to invest is stronger when employment protection creates an expectation of long-lasting matches. We argue that changes in the economic environment have reduced relationship-specific investment for less-educated workers in the United States, but not for better-protected workers in Germany. |
| JEL: | E24 J24 J31 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27331&r=all |
| By: | Niklas Potrafke; Marcus Rösch; Heinrich Ursprung |
| Abstract: | We ask three questions. First, do election systems differ in how they translate physical attractiveness of candidates into electoral success? Second, do political parties strategically exploit the “beauty premium” when deciding on which candidates to nominate, and, third, do elected MPs use their beauty premium to reap some independence from their party? Using the German election system that combines first-past-the-post election with party-list proportional representation, our results show that plurality elections provide more scope for translating physical attractiveness into electoral success than proportional representation. Whether political parties strategically use the beauty premium to optimize their electoral objectives is less clear. Physically attractive MPs, however, allow themselves to dissent more often, i.e. they vote more often against the party line than their less attractive peers. |
| Keywords: | attractiveness of politicians, safe district, party strategies, electoral success, electoral system |
| JEL: | D72 J45 J70 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_8296&r=all |
| By: | Piotr Lewandowski; Albert Park; Simone Schotte |
| Abstract: | Studies of the effects of technology and globalization on employment and inequality commonly assume that occupations are identical around the world in the job tasks they require. To relax this assumption, we develop a regression-based methodology to predict the country-specific routine task intensity (RTI) of occupations based on survey data collected in 46 low-, middle- and high-income countries. We find that within the same occupation jobs in low- and middle-income countries are more routine intensive than in high-income countries. We attribute these differences mainly to lower technology use in less-developed countries. Using predicted country-specific RTI measures for 87 countries that together employ more than 2.5 billion workers, we find that from 2000 to 2017 the shift away from routine work and towards non-routine work in low- and middle-income countries was much slower than in the high-income countries. The gap in average RTI increased and high-income countries remain the dominant provider of non-routine work. In contrast, assuming that occupations are identical around the world significantly overestimates the role of non-routine tasks in low- and middle-income countries and leads to an implausible conclusion that they have become the dominant supplier of non-routine work. |
| Keywords: | de-routinization, economic development, global division of labour, task content of jobs, skills |
| JEL: | J21 J23 J24 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ibt:wpaper:wp062020&r=all |
| By: | Gathmann, Christina (Heidelberg University); Huttunen, Kristiina (VATT, Helsinki); Jernström, Laura (University of Helsinki); Sääksvuori, Lauri (University of Turku); Stitzing, Robin (Aalto University) |
| Abstract: | We study how a negative labor market shock like job loss generates health spillovers in couples. Using administrative data of all workers and firms matched to mortality and patient records, we document that male job displacement increases the mortality risk for both the man and his partner. For every 10,000 displaced men, there are 27 additional deaths over a 5-year period rising to 115 additional deaths over two decades. Of those, 60% accrue to the displaced worker but 40% are due to excess spousal mortality. Deaths from cardiovascular diseases jump up and hospitalization records show more treatments for alcohol-related disorders and mental health issues. We also find a stunning gender asymmetry: while male job displacement generates large and persistent health effects, no such dire health consequences are observed after a woman loses her job. We explore three explanations for the observed health spillovers: risk sharing through spousal labor supply; earnings losses and the role of public insurance; and the influence of gender roles and family structure. |
| Keywords: | job displacement, mortality, spillovers, added worker, public insurance, gender roles |
| JEL: | I14 J21 J63 J12 D13 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13329&r=all |
| By: | Azmat, Ghazala (Sciences Po); Hensvik, Lena (Uppsala University, Department of Economics); Rosenqvist, Olof (IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy) |
| Abstract: | Following the arrival of the first child, women’s absence rates soar and become less predictable due to the greater frequency of their own sickness and the need to care for sick children. In this paper, we argue that this fall in presenteeism in the workplace hurts women’s wages, not only indirectly and gradually, through a slower accumulation of human capital, but also immediately, through a direct negative effect on productivity in unique jobs (i.e., jobs with low substitutability). Although both presenteeism and uniqueness are highly rewarded, we document that women’s likelihood of holding jobs with low substitutability decreases substantially relative to men’s after the arrival of the first child. This gap persists over time, with important long-run wage implications. We highlight that the parenthood wage penalty for women could be reduced by organizing work in such a way that more employees have tasks that, at least in the short run, can be performed satisfactorily by other employees in the workplace. |
| Keywords: | first child; presenteeism; couples; job substitutability; gender wage gap |
| JEL: | J16 J22 |
| Date: | 2020–06–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2020_009&r=all |
| By: | Mark L. Bryan (Department of Economics, University of Sheffield, UK); Nigel Rice (Centre for Health Economics and Department of Economics and Related Studies, University of York, UK); Jennifer Roberts (Department of Economics, University of Sheffield, UK); Cristina Sechel (Department of Economics, University of Sheffield, UK) |
| Abstract: | The disability employment gap is an issue of concern in most Western developed economies. This paper provides important empirical evidence on the influence of mental health on the probability of being in employment for prime age workers. We use longitudinal data and recently developed techniques, which use selection on observable characteristics to provide information on selection along unobservable factors, to estimate an unbiased effect of changes in mental health. Our results suggest that selection into mental health is almost entirely based on time-invariant characteristics, and hence fixed effects estimates are unbiased in this context. Our results indicate that transitioning into poor mental health leads to a reduction of 1.6 percentage points in the probability of employment. This is approximately 10 per cent of the raw employment gap. This effect is substantially smaller than the typical instrumental variable estimates, which dominate the literature, and often provide very specific estimates of a local average treatment effect based on an arbitrary exogenous shock. These findings should provide some reassurance to practitioners using fixed effects methods to investigate the impacts of health on work. They should also be useful to policy makers as the average effect of mental health on employment for those whose mental health changes is a highly relevant policy parameter. |
| Keywords: | Mental health, employment, fixed effects, Oster bounds, UKHLS |
| JEL: | I12 J14 J24 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:shf:wpaper:2020006&r=all |
| By: | Kuhn, Andreas (Swiss Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training); Wolter, Stefan C. (University of Bern) |
| Abstract: | Occupational choices remain strongly segregated by gender, for reasons not yet fully understood. In this paper, we use detailed information on the cognitive requirements in 130 distinct learnable occupations in the Swiss apprenticeship system to describe the broad job content in these occupations along the things-versus-people dimension. We first show that our occupational classification along this dimension closely aligns with actual job tasks, taken from an independent data source on employers' job advertisements. We then document that female apprentices tend to choose occupations that are oriented towards working with people, while male apprentices tend to favor occupations that involve working with things. In fact, our analysis suggests that this variable is by any statistical measure among the most important proximate predictors of occupational gender segregation. In a further step, we replicate this finding using individual-level data on both occupational aspirations and actual occupational choices for a sample of adolescents at the start of 8th grade and the end of 9th grade, respectively. Using these additional data, we finally also show that the gender difference in occupational preferences is largely independent of individual, parental, and regional controls. |
| Keywords: | occupational choice, occupational gender segregation, things versus people, preferences, gender differences, job content |
| JEL: | J16 J24 D91 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13380&r=all |
| By: | Amjadi, Golnaz (CERE - the Center for Environmental and Resource Economics) |
| Abstract: | This paper aims to investigate whether the claimed conflict regarding "jobs versus the environment" exists in the Swedish manufacturing industry. The impact of environmental management costs on employment is studied using a detailed firm-level panel data for the Swedish manufacturing industry over the period 2001–2008. The results show that the sign and magnitude of such costs on employment ultimately depends on the aggregate sector-level output demand elasticity. If the output demand is inelastic, environmental management costs induce small positive net changes in employment, while a more elastic output demand could offset the positive effect and result in negative, but in most sectors relatively small, net effects on employment. Hence, the results do not generally indicate any substantial trade-off between jobs and the environment. However, in the absence of empirically estimated demand effects, the policy implication from this study still generally advocates a careful attitude regarding national environmental initiatives for sectors exposed to world market price competition. |
| Keywords: | Environmental management costs; Output demand elasticity |
| JEL: | C33 D22 J23 K32 |
| Date: | 2020–06–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:slucer:2020_013&r=all |
| By: | Christopher Cotton (Queen's University); Brent R. Hickman (Olin Business School, University of Washington); Joseph P. Price (Brigham Young University) |
| Abstract: | We develop a model in which many heterogeneous agents invest in human capital as they compete for better college admission slots or employment opportunities. The model provides theoretical predictions about how affirmative action or preferential treatment policies change the distribution of effort, human capital accumulation, and job/college slot allocations across different population groups. Our findings deliver two key insights. First, incentives to invest in human capital depends substantially on the strength of one's competition. Second, we find evidence of a counter-intuitive role for preferential treatment in promoting overall human capital development. |
| Keywords: | large contest, all-pay contest, all-pay auction, affirmative action, college admissions, field experiment, human capital |
| JEL: | J15 J24 C93 D82 D44 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qed:wpaper:1433&r=all |
| By: | Olivia S. Mitchell |
| Abstract: | In the wake of the global pandemic known as COVID-19, retirees, along with those hoping to retire someday, have been shocked into a new awareness of the need for better risk management tools to handle longevity and aging. This paper offers an assessment of the status quo prior to the spread of the coronavirus, evaluates how retirement systems are faring in the wake of the shock. Next we examine insurance and financial market products that may render retirement systems more resilient for the world’s aging population. Finally, potential roles for policymakers are evaluated. |
| JEL: | G23 H55 J26 J32 |
| Date: | 2020–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27261&r=all |
| By: | Jacopo Mazza (University of Essex); Hans van Ophem (University of Amsterdam) |
| Abstract: | We investigate the major choice of college graduates where we make choice dependent on expected initial wages and expected wage growth per major. We build a model that allows us to estimate these factors semiparametrically and that corrects for selection bias. We estimate the model on the combined NLSY79 and NLSY97 samples. We find markedly different results in expected real wage growth and expected initial wages across majors. Furthermore, the dierences in these expectations appear to be relevant for major choice. |
| Keywords: | Wage inequality, Wage uncertainty, Unobserved heterogeneity, Selection bias, Decision-making under Risk and Uncertainty, Semiparametric estimation |
| JEL: | J31 C14 C34 D81 |
| Date: | 2020–06–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tin:wpaper:20200030&r=all |
| By: | Hari Sharma (University of Waikato); John Gibson (University of Waikato) |
| Abstract: | In the last two decades, Nepal experienced a significant rise in work-related migration and subsequent remittance inflows. We examine the impacts on child education and child labour in a two-wave panel constructed from the 2008 Nepal Labour Force Survey and the 2010 Nepal Living Standards Survey. We use grade-specific net enrolment rates rather than the more commonly studied attendance rate, and exploit variation in destination-driven predicted migration as an instrumental variable. Migration and remittances appear to raise net enrolment of children in secondary education. The positive effect on school outcomes is complemented by a fall in child labour force participation. The effects appear larger for children aged ten and above, and seem to predominantly operate through remittances. |
| Keywords: | human capital; child labour; migration; school enrolment; Nepal |
| JEL: | E20 J22 F22 I21 O15 |
| Date: | 2020–06–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:20/07&r=all |
| By: | Cho, Seung Jin (Iowa State University); Lee, Jun Yeong (Iowa State University); Winters, John V. (Iowa State University) |
| Abstract: | Food production and distribution is essential for human well-being, but the food sector has experienced a number of difficulties maintaining worker health and productivity during the COVID-19 pandemic. We examine employment status changes of persons recently employed in the U.S. food sector with a focus on food manufacturing and grocery stores. We find that the pandemic significantly reduced the probability of continued active employment for previous workers in both food manufacturing and grocery stores. Individual-level analysis confirms that the COVID-19 infection rate in an individual's local labor market is a strong and significant factor. The employment changes are not just due to unemployment during facility closures. Previous workers increasingly exit the labor force as the severity of the COVID-19 infection rate in their local area worsens. The considerable risk of infection drives many previous food sector workers to stop working altogether. Maintaining worker health and safety is essential for a stable food supply. |
| Keywords: | COVID-19, coronavirus, pandemic, food sector, employment, worker safety |
| JEL: | J2 Q1 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13334&r=all |
| By: | Sauermann, Jan (Swedish Institute for Social Research, Stockholm University) |
| Abstract: | Do reciprocal workers have higher returns to employer-sponsored training? Using a field experiment with random assignment to training combined with survey information on workers’ reciprocal inclinations, the results show that reciprocal workers reciprocate employers’ training investments by higher post-training performance. This result, which is robust to controlling for observed personality traits and worker fixed effects, suggests that individuals reciprocate the firm’s human capital investment with higher effort, in line with theoretical models on gift exchange in the workplace. This finding provides an alternative rationale to explain firm training investments even with risk of poaching. |
| Keywords: | on-the-job training; reciprocity; worker performance; field experiment |
| JEL: | D03 J24 M53 |
| Date: | 2020–06–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:sofiwp:2020_006&r=all |
| By: | Dupuy, Arnaud (University of Luxembourg); Galichon, Alfred (New York University); Jaffe, Sonia (University of Chicago); Kominers, Scott Duke (Harvard University) |
| Abstract: | We analyze the effects of taxation in two-sided matching markets where agents have heterogeneous preferences over potential partners. Our model provides a continuous link between models of matching with and without transfers. Taxes generate inefficiency on the allocative margin, by changing who matches with whom. This allocative inefficiency can be non-monotonic, but is weakly increasing in the tax rate under linear taxation if each worker has negative non-pecuniary utility of working. We adapt existing econometric methods for markets without taxes to our setting, and estimate preferences in the college-coach football market. We show through simulations that standard methods inaccurately measure deadweight loss. |
| Keywords: | matching, taxation |
| JEL: | C78 D3 H2 J3 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13328&r=all |
| By: | Takeo Hoshi; Anil K Kashyap |
| Abstract: | We take some well-known observations about the structure of the Japanese labor market and add new evidence about how it has evolved to study inflation in Japan. Our key finding is that labor market dynamics shifted after 1998 so that correlations between labor market tightness and wages weakened noticeably. This change was accompanied in a break in the relationship between wages and prices, so wage inflation has become a much less important determinant of price inflation. |
| JEL: | E31 E50 J31 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27332&r=all |
| By: | Tobias Schultheiss; Uschi Backes-Gellner |
| Abstract: | Staying competitive requires firms and workers to use the latest technology. Updating educational curricula may help with meeting such requirements by bringing new technologies faster into jobs. To estimate the technology diffusion effect of curriculum updates, we combine text data from occupational curricula and from job advertisements. With additional innovation data we control for the natural spread of technologies. We examine whether curriculum updates (introducing a particular technology such as computer-numerical-controlled machinery, computer-aided design software or desktop publishing solutions) led to firms adopting and integrating these technologies earlier into the jobs of updated occupations. We find that, as measured by technology mentions in job advertisements, curriculum updates substantially accelerate technology diffusion into jobs, especially into those of smaller non-innovative firms. |
| JEL: | O33 I25 J23 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iso:educat:0173&r=all |