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Immigration and Redistribution in Europe – A lower support for redistribution when the share of immigrants is higher
In almost every European country, the share of immigrants has increased substantially during the past decades. This has sparked a public debate about economic benefits of immigration and perceived threats to social cohesion. In new IZA discussion paper, Alberto Alesina, Elie Murard and Hillel Rapoport provide empirical evidence on attitudinal shifts against redistribution among European-born … Continue reading
Gig-Economy and Entrepreneurial Activity – It reduces lower quality entrepreneurial activity research finds
We examine how the entry of gig-economy platforms influences local entrepreneurial activity. On one hand, such platforms may reduce entrepreneurial activity by offering stable employment for the un- and under-employed. On the other hand, such platforms may enable entrepreneurial activity by offering work flexibility that allows the entrepreneur to re-deploy resources strategically in order to … Continue reading
Minimum Wage In Seattle – Increases labor costs, mildly reduces demand for low-wage jobs, but doesn’t increase prices
In this paper we revisit the question of how businesses respond to the minimum wage using evidence from a large minimum wage hike in Seattle. In 2014 the City of Seattle passed the Minimum Wage Ordinance, which raised the minimum wage to $15 over several years. We examine the minimum wage effect during the first … Continue reading
Autonomous Vehicle in US – How to cope with their effects on workers
How will the introduction and diffusion of autonomous vehicles (AVs) affect U.S. workers? This highly fraught question promises soon to loom large in hometowns and policy realms across the nation. Given Americans’ current reliance on cars and trucks for most of our transportation, the transition to self-driving vehicles will change many lives and livelihoods, likely … Continue reading
Minimum Wages in US – Three conclusions on the impacts
Minimum wages have been studied so extensively that it is rare to find a fresh angle that piques labor economists’ interest. Despite a mountain of literature, advances in empirical methods, and the availability of new data, definitive studies are scarcer than policymakers would hope to find. The empirical challenges researchers of the minimum wage face … Continue reading
Stereotypes and Biases – Do teachers change when they become aware of them ?
Stereotypes are over-generalized representations of characteristics of certain groups. They allow for easier and efficient processing of information, but they may cause biased judgment or even discrimination against particular groups. In addition, discrimination may lead to self-fulfilling prophecies by influencing the behavior of discriminated groups in the direction of the stereotypes. If individuals become aware … Continue reading
Working at Home – Telework increases stress study finds
Homeworking comes with pro and cons. While some describe as an ideal that combines family life and work, others depict it as chaotic and stressful – just imagine your cat sitting on the laptop, your baby crying on the ground, and your dog biting the shoes. According to a recent IZA discussion paper by Younghwan Song … Continue reading
Unemployment and Wage Growth in US – No sharp pickup in wage growth foreseen by FRBSF
The unemployment rate ended 2018 at just under 4%, substantially lower than most estimates of the natural rate. Could such an ostensibly tight labor market lead to a sharp pickup in wage growth from its recent moderate pace, such that the relationship between wage growth and unemployment is not always linear? Investigations using state-level data … Continue reading
Vocational vs General Education – Each country should aim to find the right balance
Vocational skills are job-specific skills that prepare for work in specific occupations. By contrast, the usage of general skills transcends specific occupations. In dynamically changing economies, this difference implies a basic trade-off between vocational and general education programs for labor-market experiences over the life-cycle. Vocational education programs have the advantage of helping young people master … Continue reading
Employment-to-Population Ratio in US – Why the decline ?
For several decades now, the employment rate among prime-age U.S adults has been falling. Less-educated males have experienced the largest drop in employment, but the troubling trends in participation are not limited to this group. Employment rates among women, which had been rising since the late 1960s, have stagnated and in some recent years declined. … Continue reading
Self-Esteem in Childhood and Occupational Achievements – Boys and Girls are different
This study investigates the impact of self-esteem during childhood on men’s and women’s occupational prestige in young adulthood. By combining first-hand information from parents in the Swedish Level-of-Living surveys (LNU) 2000 and their children in the Child-LNU in 2000 and the follow-up study in LNU-2010, we are able to assess how self-esteem during adolescence is … Continue reading
Wheelchair Users in Montreal and Quebec City – Disability reduces callback rates by employers by 50%
Despite wage subsidies and various other government programs that provide incentives for firms to hire workers with disabilities, this group is still disadvantaged in the labor market. An IZA discussion paper by Canadian researchers Charles Bellemare, Marion Goussé, Guy Lacroix and Steeve Marchand investigates the determinants and extent of labor market discrimination toward people with physical … Continue reading
The Impact of Automation on Inequality – Increasing it says St. Louis Fed’s study
We use estimates from Frey and Osborne (2017) of how likely automation is to affect occupations. They first identify the tasks of each occupation that may become automated: perception and manipulation tasks, creative intelligence tasks, and social intelligence tasks. Then they use a machine learning algorithm to calculate the probabilities of computerization. We merge their … Continue reading
The New Labor Market in US – Do the widely used measures undercount ?
The CPS and ATUS questions used to classify labor force status are similar, and both rely on the words “work” and “job.” Some researchers feel that these questions fail to resonate with gig workers and those in informal employment arrangements. They argue that, as a result, two widely used measures could be considerably undercounted—the total … Continue reading
Apprenticeship Training – Do firms benefit from it ?
The workforce strategy of firms is increasingly important for competitiveness and for producing at high quality and low costs. Firms must decide on the mix of skills and wages for current and future operations and on whether to train skilled workers or hire them from the open labour market. While traditional human capital theory states … Continue reading
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