The economic performance of cities: A Markov-switching approach

This paper examines the determinants of employment growth in metro areas. To obtain growth rates, we use a Markov-switching model that separates a city's growth path into two distinct phases (high and low), each with its own growth rate. The simple average growth rate over some period is, therefore, the weighted average of the high-phase and low-phase growth rates, with the weight being the frequency of the two phases. We estimate the effects of a variety of factors separately for the high-phase and low-phase growth rates. Growth in the high phase is related to both human capital and industry mix, while growth in the low phase is related to industry mix only, specifically, the relative importance of manufacturing. Overall, our results strongly reject the notion that city-level characteristics influence employment growth equally across the phases of the business cycle.     

Industry Mix, Wages, and the Divergence of County Income in Pennsylvania

Per capita incomes have diverged across Pennsylvania counties. County incomes may differ because of differences in industrial structures and because of differences in earnings within industries; a county may have a below-average income because its industry mix is comprised of low paying jobs or because county jobs pay low wages compared to the same jobs in other counties. A procedure developed by Hanna (1951) is utilized to separate income differences into these two components by constructing two counterfactual incomes for each county. The handful of high-income counties in Pennsylvania have favorable wages while the counties with incomes below the state average, although with employment mixes comparable to the overall state mix, tend to have workers who receive low wages relative to the state industry average. Wages are low in the relatively poor counties due to less investment in physical and human capital.     

Industry Agglomerations and Employment Change in Non-Metropolitan Areas

The purpose of this study is to determine the role of industry agglomerations on industry-level employment change in non-metro areas of the United States. Regression analysis of cross-sectional data is used to estimate the determinants of non-metro 1981–1992 employment change for ten two-digit SIC manufacturing industries. Industry agglomerations in metro and non-metro areas are identified using cluster analysis. Area characteristics included in the regression equations are diversity of the local economy, industry mix, average plant size and availability of urbanization economies. The findings indicate that industry agglomerations were associated with both larger employment gains in areas with growing industry employment and larger employment losses for areas with declining employment. Neither regional specialization in the industry nor nearby metro agglomerations were significant determinants of employment change in non-metro areas.     

Knowledge Spillovers and Growth in the Disagglomeration of the Us Advertising-Agency Industry

We investigate knowledge spillovers and externalities in the disagglomeration and growth of the advertising-agency industry. A simple model of high demand, low wages, and externalities associated with clusters of related industries can explain the dispersion of advertising agency employment across states. Other factors affected the industry growth rate within states. Consistent with Jacobs and Porter but contrary to Marshall, Arrow, and Romer, competition, but not specialization, enhanced growth. In accord with Porter (1990), growth increased with buyer cluster size. Diversity had no effect on growth. Despite improvements in telecommunications and transportation reducing effective distances, location still matters.     

浙江省产业结构与就业结构协调性及影响因素实证研究

为了研究浙江省产业结构和就业结构的协调性,根据《2019年浙江省统计年鉴》的相关数据,对浙江省2000—2018年产业结构和就业结构的演变规律、三次产业的就业弹性以及三次产业的产业结构与就业结构的偏离度进行了研究,研究结果表明两者之间的协调水平较低。又通过灰色关联法对影响两者协调发展的因素进行了实证分析,结果显示每种因素对浙江省产业结构偏离度的影响程度从高到低依次为工业化率、城镇化率、教育水平、人均GDP、外商直接投资(FDI)、R&D经费投入。最后提出可以通过做优一产、增加一产产值,扩大一产劳动力容量;做强二产,提高浙江工业化率,增强浙江经济增长动力;通过加速浙江省的城镇化进程和打造现代服务业做活三产,提高浙江经济发展水平;通过优化人力资源,提高劳动者的素质和技能,提高劳动者就业能力等措施提高浙江省产业结构和就业结构的协调性。     

Distortionary Taxation and Labour Market Performance

Quarterly estimates of consumption, capital and labour tax rates are provided for six major OECD countries. We then use the 'stylized facts' methodology to evaluate the strength, sign and phase of cyclical comovements between tax rates and labour market variables. Labour taxes distort labour market de-cisions and help explain why the unemployment rate is so high in continental Europe. However, labour taxes cannot be the only determinant of diverging unemployment rates since the labour force is also reduced by higher taxes. Finally, we offer some preliminary structural evidence showing employment growth in particular to be negatively related to the taxation of labour.     

Differentiating employment prospects by industry and returns to job search in metropolitan areas

The role of differentiating employment prospects by the industry of the employer in the job seeker's calculation of the returns to search is analyzed. It is demonstrated that returns to search can vary systematically between metropolitan areas because of differing mixes of industry employment; it is argued that an increase in a measure of dispersion in the industry mix will tend to raise returns to job search. To test this hypothesis, cross sections of census data on unemployment rates of male experienced workers in each of the seven major occupational groups were analyzed. Statistically significant regression equations were obtained for three occupational groups (craftsmen, nonfarm laborers, and operatives); in all these cases the results supported the hypothesis of the paper.     

Regional differences in small firm entry in manufacturing industries: Lower Saxony, 1979–1991 †

This paper is an empirical study of inter-regional and inter-temporal variations in entry of new firms using longitudinal data covering all manufacturing establishments in Lower Saxony between 1979 and 1991. Patterns of entry are reported for sixteen regions based on gross rates of entry (number of new firms) and entry intensities (shares of employees). An empirical model is applied to detect regional characteristics that are highly correlated with entry. Pooling of cross-section and time-series data allows for control of influences of varying macroeconomic conditions and unobserved regional characteristics that turned out to be important. Small firm entry tends to be positively related to high overall economic growth, and to be higher in regions where both the small firm employment share and the level of wealth are high while the wage rate is low. We find no evidence for a negative impact of the business tax rate or for a positive effect of regional subsidies.     

Self-employment and job generation in metropolitan areas, 1969–2009

Many regional development policy initiatives assume that entrepreneurial activities promote economic growth. Empirical research has presented rationale for this argument showing that small firms create proportionally more new jobs than large firms. However, little research has been performed on the issue of net job generation at the urban level, particularly when self-employment is considered as an indicator of entrepreneurial activities. This paper investigates to what extent US metropolitan areas in the 1969–2009 period characterized by relatively high rates of self-employment also have shown relatively high rates of subsequent total employment growth. The analysis corrects for the influence of sectoral composition, wage level, educational attainment, presence of research universities and size of the metropolitan area to measure the extent to which the number and quality of self-employed in a region contribute to total employment growth. It finds the relationship between self-employment rates and subsequent total employment growth to be positive on average during the 40-year period but to weaken over time.     

How low can U go?

• ? Although there is growing evidence that wage growth is building in response to low and falling unemployment in the advanced economies, there is scope for unemployment rates to fall further without triggering a pay surge.
• ? For a start, current unemployment rates in comparison to past cyclical troughs overstate the tightness of labour markets. Demographic trends associated with the ageing ‘baby boomer’ bulge have pushed down the headline unemployment rate – unemployment rates among older workers are lower than those of younger cohorts. And in a historical context, Europe still has a large pool of involuntary part‐timers.
• ? In addition, rising participation rates mean that demographics are less of a constraint on employment growth than widely assumed. In both 2017 and 2018, had it not been for increased activity rates (mainly for older cohorts), unemployment would have had to fall more sharply to accommodate the same employment increase. We expect rising participation rates to continue to act as a pressure valve for the labour market.
• ? Finally, unemployment rates were generally far lower during the 1950s and 1960s than now. If wages stay low relative to productivity, as was the case during that prior era, employment growth may remain strong, with unemployment falling further. In the post‐war era, low wages were partly a function of a grand bargain in which policy‐makers provided full employment in return for low wage growth.
• ? There is evidence to suggest that many post‐crisis workers have opted for the security of their existing full‐time job and its associated benefits despite lower wage growth, rather than change job and potentially earn more; the rise of the ‘gig economy’ has led some workers to value what they already have more. Put another way, the non‐accelerating inflation rate of unemployment (NAIRU) has fallen. So, the role of labour market tightness in pushing wage growth higher may continue to surprise to the downside.

     

经济增长与就业率的关系研究——以广州市为例

实证分析表明,1978-2006年广州市GDP增长率、就业增长率和就业弹性变化趋势基本上一致,三者之中就业增长率波动的幅度较小,GDP增长率和就业弹性波动的幅度较大。广州市经济增长与就业之间存在长期稳定关系,经济每增长1%,就业增长0.23%。广州市三次产业吸纳就业的能力不同,第三产业吸纳就业能力最强,其次为第二产业;第一产业劳动力随着经济增长逐步转移到第二产业和第三产业。     

New evidence on the origins of corporate crime

The intuition that poorly performing corporations are more likely to engage in crime is found throughout the contemporary literature on the economics and law and economics of corporate misconduct. Yet little evidence of such a relationship exists. This paper presents new evidence on the relationship between prior performance and corporate crime, using panel data on public corporations, 1975–92. When prior performance is measured in terms of earnings, only very weak evidence of a relationship is found. However, we find that a low rate of sales or employment growth by the firm tends to be a good predictor of environmental crime, and that environmental crime tends to occur in industries that have had relatively high rates of growth, as measured by employment or sales. This suggests that it is the performance of the firm rather than or relative to that of the industry that matters. Support for this finding is robust. The data provide weaker support for the notion that prior performance affects the occurrence of other types of corporate crime, particularly fraud. This may reflect the presence of mechanisms through which potential fraud victims, unlike potential environmental crime victims, can and do respond to events that would increase their chances of becoming crime victims by taking steps to prevent it. Finally, larger firms are found significantly more likely to have engaged in crime than smaller firms, in contrast to recent suggestions in the literature.     

中国装备制造产业创新网络运行效率及提升策略研究

通过分析装备制造产业创新网络运行机理,选取BBC模型、Malmquist指数作为运行效率测度模型,结合装备制造产业创新网络面板数据对其运行效率进行测度,结果表明:2008—2018年中国装备制造产业创新网络整体运行效率以平均每年8.7%的速度递增;从地区角度看,创新网络运行效率呈“东—中—西”阶梯差异态势,但差异态势逐年缩小;从省份角度看,全国26个省份运行效率存在异质性,大体可分为第一、二、三、四梯队;技术水平进步对全要素生产率增长的提升作用要大于纯技术效率和规模效率贡献;技术研发阶段效率低于成果转化阶段效率,两阶段存在脱节现象。创新网络是推动装备制造产业创新升级的重要力量之一,中国要坚定不移地推进创新驱动战略,以提升装备制造产业创新网络运行效率;依据不同地区、不同省份装备制造产业创新网络状况,实施差异化政策组合,以提升运行效率;注重研发技术市场化,以提升成果转化阶段效率。     

UNIVERSAL PRESCHOOL PROGRAMS AND LONG-TERM CHILD OUTCOMES: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

What are the long-term effects of universal preschool programs on child outcomes? We review 26 studies using natural experiments to estimate the effects of universal preschool programs for children aged 0–6 years on child outcomes measured from third grade to adulthood. Studies comparing universal preschool with a mix of parental, family, and private modes of care show mixed effects on test scores and on measures related to health, well-being, and behavior. All estimates for outcomes related to adequate primary and secondary school progression, years of schooling, highest degree completed, employment, and earnings indicate beneficial average effects of universal preschool programs. Three of the included studies calculate benefits-to-costs ratios and find ratios clearly above one. Universal preschool tends to be more beneficial for children with low socioeconomic status and there are not consistently different effects for boys or girls. Only three studies compare two alternative types of universal preschool programs in terms of long-term outcomes.     

京沪服务业增长比较分析

利用1978年至2009年的时间序列数据,基于鲍莫尔—富克斯提出的服务业就业份额增长的影响因素理论,对北京和上海的服务业增长进行了实证检验及比较。从计量分析结果来看,京沪服务业劳动生产率的增长都相对滞后,这是两市服务业就业增长较快的主因,而这也正符合鲍莫尔—富克斯假说的基本观点。但是具体说来,北京和上海的服务业增长也存在着明显差异:影响北京服务业就业增长的因素中仅有服务业劳动生产率增长滞后的影响是显著的,地区人均收入增长这一因素的影响则不显著;而服务业劳动生产率增长滞后和人均收入增长这两个因素对上海服务业就业增长均产生了显著的积极影响。     

Industry Dynamics and Competition from Low‐Wage Countries: Evidence on Italy

This article analyses the effect of competition from low‐wage countries on domestic activity, using data on 230 Italian manufacturing sectors between 1995 and 2007. It finds that low‐wage import penetration is negatively related to employment and other measures of activity. The effect is significantly smaller in more skill, capital and R&D‐intensive sectors and in more vertically differentiated sectors. There is also evidence of significant effects of low‐wage competition through inter‐industry linkages: employment is negatively related to low‐wage import penetration in downstream sectors but positively related to low‐wage import penetration in upstream sectors.     

Technology: Measuring the socioeconomic impact of manufacturing automation

In this report the potential savings of computer-directed manufacturing systems are hypothesized. It is contended that computer-directed automation of manufacturing is a continuation of the ongoing technological progress that the United States has been experiencing. Technological progress has significantly contributed to the growth of the GNP, permitting a high rate of return on investment. It is our contention that the development of computer-based automation will yield benefits greater than those produced by conventional technological progress. However, this present paper examines cost savings rather than contribution to growth. The reduction in the production costs of the discrete manufacturing sector made possible by computer-based automation is hypothesized by assuming the existence of an automated factory, although such a factory is in reality perhaps several decades away. Many assumptions are made about costs, their components and relationships. Case studies, literature references, opinions of consultants, and other informed but conjectural judgments provide the basis for the hypothesis.The impacts of computer-directed manufacturing automation upon environment, employment, general price level, urban/rural mix, and international trade are also conjectured. A number of definitions and distinctions are made with respect to automation, productivity, technology, and related points.     

Firm-specific wage growth and changes in the labor market for managers

This paper analyzes recent changes in the employment relationships between managers and firms. In both Becker's and Lazear's models of firm-specific wage growth, compensation is deferred from early in an employee's tenure with a firm until later in the contract. The deferred compensation bonds the worker to the firm. Based on cross-sectional data from Current Population Surveys, rates of firm-specific wage growth are estimated for the managerial labor market. The findings show that the rate of wage growth that is firm-specific for managers in manufacturing industries declined significantly during the early 1980s. It is estimated, for example, that a manager with 12 years of tenure in a manufacturing firm enjoyed, on average, a 25% wage premium in 1979 over an otherwise similar manager who was a new hire in a firm. By 1983 the firm-specific wage premium for a manager with 12 years of tenure was only 5%. These changes represent a significant reduction in the strength of the employment bond between firms and managers, and a reduction in the incentive effects previously enjoyed by firms from the use of deferred-compensation schemes. This change is consistent with the significant increases in the displacement rates of managers that occurred during the 1980s.     

Sectoral Shocks and Metropolitan Employment Growth

In this paper, we study the sources of industry employment growth in each of five metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs). The objective is to understand the relative importance of aggregate disturbances versus local sectoral shocks in generating observed employment fluctuations at the MSA level. The empirical evidence presented in this paper derives from structural vector autoregressions (SVARs), estimated for each of the five MSAs. Estimations use monthly employment data covering nine one-digit industrial categories for the period 1951:1–1999:8, as well as two variables that capture the influences of aggregate (i.e., national) shocks on MSAs. We find that within-MSA industry shocks explain considerably more of the forecast error variance in industry employment growth than do aggregate shocks. Sectoral shocks account for between 87 and 94% of the 36-month-ahead forecast error variance. Among individual local sectors, shocks to MSA-specific government, manufacturing, and service sector employment growth are the predominate sources of variability.     

Wage-setting institutions as industrial policy

Centralized wage-setting arrangements compress wage differentials along many dimensions, but how do they affect employment structure? To address this issue, we relate the evolution of US–Swedish differences in the industry distribution of employment to relative wages between and within industries. We find that centralized wage setting shifted Swedish employment away from industries with high wage dispersion among workers, a high mean wage and, especially, a low mean wage. The dissolution of Sweden's centralized wage-setting beginning in 1983 led to widening wage differentials and a reversal in the evolution of US–Swedish differences in industry structure.