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on Unemployment, Inequality and Poverty |
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Issue of 2024‒07‒15
four papers chosen by |
| By: | Andrew E. Clark; Conchita D'Ambrosio; Anthony Lepinteur |
| Abstract: | We evaluate the link between job insecurity and one of the most-important decisions that individuals take: homeownership. The 1999 rise in the French Delalande tax on firms that laid off older workers produced an unexpected exogenous rise in job insecurity for younger workers. A difference-in-differences analysis of panel data from the European Community Household Panel shows that this greater job insecurity significantly reduced the probability of becoming a homeowner. This drop seems more attributable to individual preferences rather than greater capital constraints, consistent with individuals reducing their exposure to long-term financial commitments in more-uncertain environments. |
| Keywords: | homeownership, job insecurity, employment protection, difference-in-differences |
| Date: | 2024–06–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp2006&r= |
| By: | Adamecz, Anna (University College London); Shure, Nikki (University College London) |
| Abstract: | Recent evidence on the gender wage gap shows that it has remained stagnant for those with a university degree and is the largest at the top of the earnings distribution. Many studies have explored institutional factors that contribute to the gender wage gap, but there is little evidence on the role of non-cognitive traits, including overconfidence. This is surprising given its prominence in academic and popular literature. We use a measure of overconfidence captured in adolescence to explain the gender wage gap at age 42. Our results show that overconfidence explains approximately 5.5% of the unconditional gender wage gap. This is driven by women being more underconfident, not men being more overconfident. Furthermore, we find negative wage returns on being underconfident for both men and women. Most of this penalty works via occupational sorting, having lower pre-university educational outcomes, and being less likely to study high-return subjects at university. This has implications for the limitations of workplace-based interventions aimed at boosting women's confidence. |
| Keywords: | gender gaps, gender wage gap, overconfidence, underconfidence |
| JEL: | I24 I26 J24 |
| Date: | 2024–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17033&r= |
| By: | Fluchtmann, Jonas (OECD); Glenny, Anita Marie (Aarhus University); Harmon, Nikolaj (University of Copenhagen); Maibom, Jonas (Aarhus University) |
| Abstract: | Using data on applied-for jobs for the universe of Danish UI recipients, we examine variation in job search behavior both across individuals and over time during unemployment spells. We find large differences in the level of applied-for wages across individuals but over time all individuals adjust wages downward in the same way. The decline in applied-for wages over time is descriptively small but economically important in standard models of job search. We find similar results when examining variation in the non-wage characteristics of applied-for jobs and in the search methods used to find them. We discuss implications for theory. |
| Keywords: | job search dynamics |
| JEL: | J64 |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17048&r= |
| By: | Agan, Amanda (Cornell University); Cowgill, Bo (Columbia Business School); Gee, Laura Katherine (Tufts University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates whether the success of salary history bans could be limited by job-seekers volunteering their salaries unprompted. We survey American workers in 2019 and 2021 about their recent job searches, distinguishing when candidates were asked about salary history from when they were not. Historically well-paid workers may have an incentive to disclose, and employers who are aware of this could infer that non-disclosing workers are concealing low salaries. Through this mechanism, all workers could face pressure to avoid the stigma of silence. Our data shows a large percentage of workers (28%) volunteer salary history, even when a ban prevents employers from asking. An additional 47% will disclose if enough other job candidates disclose. Men are more likely than women to disclose their salaries unprompted, especially if they believe other candidates are disclosing. Over our 1.5-year sample covering jurisdictions with (and without) bans, unprompted volunteering of salary histories increased by about 6-8 percentage points. |
| Keywords: | voluntary disclosure, information economics, organizations, hiring, compensation, inequality, salary history bans, statistical discrimination |
| JEL: | D8 M51 J71 |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17065&r= |