Unionization,market structure,and economic growth

This article investigates the macroeconomic effects of unionization in a Schumpeterian growth model with an endogenous product market structure and a unionized labor market. The endogeneity of the market structure and the trade unionism of the labor market interact and jointly determine the equilibrium unemployment, firm size, number of firms, economic growth, and distribution of income between workers and firms. We show that unionization governs the distribution of income between workers and firms and the unemployment rate, but it does not give rise to any growth effect on the economy. In addition, unionization discourages potential entrants and hence decreases the equilibrium number of firms. These results echo the empirical observation in the sense that unionization raises unemployment and alters the distribution of income between workers and firms, but it does not give rise to a significant, real impact on the firms’ investment and the economy‐wide growth.     

Appropriation,firm dynamics,and wage inequality

This paper examines the income distribution and welfare effects of appropriation activities in an economy. In the short run, with a given number of firms, appropriation can narrow wage inequality between skilled and unskilled labor when the capital resources accrued by appropriators are not large. However, wage inequality widens when the capital accrued is large. In the long run, with free entry and exit of firms, an increase in appropriation can cause firms to enter when the accrued capital is not large. This gives rise to a win–win outcome by raising the wages of skilled and unskilled labor. However, if accrued capital is large, firms exit and a lose–lose situation may occur in which skilled and unskilled wages are reduced.     

Land Endowment,Intersectoral Labor Mobility,and Economic Geography

The distribution of industries is studied in a general equilibrium model in which firms producing manufactured products engage in oligopolistic competition. The agricultural product is produced by land and labor and there is intersectoral labor mobility between the agricultural sector and the manufacturing sector. Results are derived analytically. When worker units are divisible, concentration of all workers in one region is not stable. The role of land in the production of the agricultural product is important in affecting the distribution of industries.     

城镇化、劳动力转移与物价

从城镇化、劳动力转移的角度看,我国物价表现出的食品与住房价格持续上涨的结构性上涨是城镇化和工业化阶段的必然现象,但与各阶层的贫富差距存在很高的相关性,只有倚重财税政策和产业政策影响财富分配和资本、劳动力的产业分配,充分发挥信贷政策的结构调整功能,才能有效地控制物价。     

Farm size,land yields and the agricultural production function: An analysis for fifteen developing countries

The paper analyzes the relationship between factor inputs, land yields and labor productivity for farms of different size on the basis of FAO farm management data for 15 developing countries. For all but three countries a strong negative correlation is found between farm size on the one side, and factor inputs and yields per hectare on the other. The fitting of unconstrained production functions to the above data suggests that in only few cases the decline in yields for increasing farm size can be attributed to decreasing returns to scale. The higher yields observed in small farms are mainly to be ascribed to higher factor inputs and to a more intensive use of land. Therefore, where conspicuous labor surpluses exist, the superiority of small farming provides solid arguments in favor of land redistribution. Such an agrarian reform would determine higher output, higher labor absorption and a more equitable income distribution, thus contributing in a decisive manner to the alleviation of rural poverty. The paper also provides estimates of cross-sectional production functions for the 15 countries analyzed. Empirical relations are found between the output elasticities of land, labor and intermediate inputs and physical indicators of their scarcity. The paper concludes by proposing a simple method for deriving a long-term production function for agriculture.     

ASEAN FTA,distribution of income,and globalization

This paper examines the impact of Free Trade Agreements on income distribution within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and between the members and their trading partners outside ASEAN. The study uses a Computable General Equilibrium model, a modified version of the 57 sector, 87 country, Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) integrated model of national input–output tables, version-6.2 (2001 database) with its reserve matrix facility, to simulate income distribution results as an outcome of certain parameter changes that appear in intra and inter regional trade.Within ASEAN, trade liberalization will stimulate the output of each country within the region according to their comparative advantage. Since trade liberalization tends to increase output of capital-intensive goods more than labor-intensive goods, the less-developed countries within the region tend to get smaller benefits compared to other member countries. In addition, the physical means of production tend to gain more relative to the gains of labor from the FTAs. This tends to widen the income gap between high-income and low-income households within ASEAN.Comparing ASEAN and the developed non-ASEAN countries, an FTA within ASEAN tends to reduce the returns to labor of the developed non-member countries and narrow the income gap between ASEAN, as a whole, and those rich countries since capital-intensive products of developing countries are often labor-intensive goods of developed countries.     

Early Smoking,Education, and Labor Market Performance

This study investigates the effects of early smoking on educational attainment and labor market performance by using mixed ordered and mixed proportional hazard models. The results show that early smoking adversely affects educational attainment and initial labor market performance, but only for males. The probability to finish a scientific degree is 4%-point lower for an early smoker. The effect of early smoking on initial labor market performance is indirect through educational attainment. Once the indirect effect is controlled for there is no direct effect. Moreover, for males only, early smoking has a negative effect on current labor market performance even after conditioning on educational attainment. The probability to have an academic job is 4%-point lower for an early smoker. For females neither education nor labor market performance is affected by early smoking.     

技术进步、效率变化、资本积累与我国地区服务业发展

本文用非参数生产前沿方法将我国1978—2007年服务业劳均产出增长分解为效率变化、技术进步和资本积累的贡献三个部分,并用方差分解方法估算了各部分对地区服务业劳均产出增长率差异的贡献,然后采用核密度分布方法分析了上述三个部分对地区服务业发展的影响。研究发现：（1）技术进步是促进各地区服务业增长的重要因素,其作用随资本积累的提高呈上升趋势;（2）效率虽然对服务业经济增长的平均贡献较小,但却是各地区服务业增长率差异的主要原因;（3）资本积累在不同时期对地区服务业增长的贡献差别很大,其作用随时间发展呈上升趋势。     

资本深化、技术进步与全球化下的劳动报酬份额

劳动报酬在国民收入中所占份额,一定程度上决定了一国最终消费需求大小。本文在新古典分配模型基础上,讨论了资本深化、技术进步以及全球化对我国劳动报酬份额影响机制,并运用省际面板数据进行实证分析。结果显示,具有资本增强属性的技术进步和过快的资本深化,偏离了现阶段我国要素禀赋结构,显著地降低了我国劳动报酬份额,全球化对提高我国劳动所得影响不明显。最后,本文给出了相关政策建议。     

Labor Quality and Inward FDI： A Firm-level Empirical Study in China

This paper investigates the relationship between labor quality and inward foreign direct investment (FDI) distribution in China using a large sample of Chinese cross‐sectional, firm‐level data, with comprehensive information about labor quality. The paper finds that labor quality measured by education level plays an important role in deciding the distribution of inward FDI, but labor quality measured by working certificates loses its significance using non‐parametric matching techniques and the instrumental variables and generalized method of moments technique. The author also finds that labor quality has a more significant impact on other foreign investments than Hong Kong‐invested, Macau‐invested and Taiwan‐invested firms. The impacts of labor quality on inward FDI are found to be strongly uneven across industries and provinces. Therefore, China should pay more attention to the education of employees in all foreign‐invested firms, and invest more in education to improve labor quality, which will help China to attract more FDI, especially technology‐intensive FDI.     

Race, culture, and skill: Interracial wage differences among African Americans, Latinos, and whites

This article examines the interrelationships among race, culture, skill, and the distribution of wages. I utilize a three-equation system to explore this process: skill is a multidimensional productive attribute measured by years of education and work effort; educational attainment is a function of class background and individual effort; and individual wage rates are a function of skill and class background. By further assuming that effort is differentially distributed across individuals and social groups, I am able to estimate reduced form equations for educational and earnings attainment, where both equations are functions of the class backgrounds and race of individuals. The collective results of this article challenge the conventional wisdom among economists that African American and Latino job skills are of a lower quality than white job skills. To the extent that effort is an important element of worker skill, our results suggest that neither African American nor Latino labor is of lower quality than white labor. The results regarding differences between African Americans and whites in educational attainment, i.e., African Americans are able to translate a given level of resources into higher levels of educational attainment, reaffirm previous findings in the literature. The results on Latino versus white educational attainment are novel. Additionally, unlike previous research, this article connects racial differences in the skill acquisition process to the economics of discrimination.     

收入分配、劳动分工多重性及其制度创新

基于纳什合作博弈议价理论,研究劳动分工对收入分配影响的多重性发现:当生产者之间的总体生产效率差异过大时,进行分工合作的利益基础会消失,收入差距会达到最大的状态。在分工条件下,生产者之间的收入差距取决于高技能生产者的总体优势强度;但分工条件下的收入差距小于自给自足下的收入差距,劳动分工具有缩小收入差距的效应。当生产者各有所长,总体优势相当,是完全互补型时,则平分分工产品,高效率与高公平同时实现,是一种最理想的分工经济。结论表明,公平与效率相统一在一定条件下可以实现。要实现经济的又好又快增长,政府应当进行以分工为基础的发展制度创新。     

The legal environment,specialized investments,incomplete contracts,and labor productivity

This paper provides a framework for analyzing the interactions among legal environments, incomplete contracts and specialized investments. It is well known that providers of specialized investments may be taken advantage when the contract is incomplete, thus an improvement in legal environments may be able to better protect those specialized asset investors and provide them with stronger incentive for specialized investments hence promote the overall level of specialization of the economy and enhance labor productivity. (1) We use the data set from IEDB(Industrial Enterprises Data Bank) of China to capture this effect. It is found that legal environment improvement does enhance the labor productivity through encouragement of specialization. This effect is robust under different settings in assumptions of endogeneity, heterogeneity and measurements of productivity index. (2) Heterogeneity analysis shows that a bigger market scale does encourage deeper specialization, more specialized investments, and thus improving the labor productivity. (3) The above conclusion holds up not only at the micro (firm) level but also at the macro level of the economy. The labor productivity increase happens with the growth of an industry along with deeper specialization and better legal environments.     

City Size,Population Concentration and Productivity: Evidence from China

This paper investigates the impact of China's city size and urban population concentration on city productivity by developing a distinctive index based on global nighttime light data. Using the panel data of 280 prefecture cities from 2004 to 2013 and employing dynamic system generalized method of moments and panel threshold model regression techniques, our results show that city size has a positive impact on city productivity; therefore, cities in China still have the potential to expand. While moderate urban population concentration can benefit city productivity, excessively concentrated urban population distribution may impede the growth of city productivity. We also find that the level of labor income significantly affects the impacts of urban agglomeration on labor productivity. Therefore, our results imply that city development policies should focus more on how to appropriately allocate economic activities and adjust population distribution in urban areas according to different stages of economic development.     

生理心理测试与按劳分配的实现

本文认为 ,在按劳分配原则实施过程中除了要考虑劳动时间、产出数量等衡量工作量的因素外 ,还应考虑劳动强度、智力疲劳、工作压力感、员工对报酬差距及竞争压力的心理承受能力等一些生理心理因素 ,以大大提高按劳动分配的实际应用效果。     

The determinants of internal migration in West Germany, 1967

Summary and Conclusion We initially set ourselves the task of explaining the geographical movement of labor in West Germany in 1967. In so doing we have investigated two alternative models; the standard model based on net advantages and the job opportunity model. Our results clearly support the thesis that job opportunities playa substantial role in the geographical distribution of labor in West Germany. Of the two measures of job opportunity the vacancy rate seems to be preferable, at least, in labor scarce economics. The standard distance variable performs quite well, perhaps unexpectedly well in light of the relatively small distances involved. This has led us to speculate that distance may be closely related to the difficulty with whichm potential movers acquire labor market information. Finally, wage differences seem not to explain the locational patterns of movers. However, the lack of variation in wages among the regions that we studied causes us to consider this result highly tentative and subject to further study.     

Do oil tariffs lower wages?

An oil tariff has potential to alter the pattern of production and income distribution across productive factors. This paper use a general equilibrium model of production and trade with inputs of capital, labor, and international energy to examine the effects of an oil tariff. Under a range of conditions, higher energy prices created by oil tariffs would lower the ratio of wages to capital rents, and production of labor intensive goods would fall. This paper concentrates on the potential of oil tariffs to alter patterns of production and income distribution.     

Labor Supply,Migration, and Long-Term Development

This article analyzes the impact of the supply of skilled and unskilled labor on the growth rate of open economies. Using an expansion-in-varieties framework, the model distinguishes between a long-term equilibrium and a medium-term adjustment path. It is demonstrated that the dynamic effects of labor supply are different in a model with expanding varieties in the consumption sector from those in a model with expanding varieties in the production sector. In addition, the outcome depends on the elasticities of substitution in production as well as the countries' production shares in world goods markets. It is shown that, in general, the supply of unskilled labor is likely to have an unfavorable effect on long-term development.     

What accounts for the decline in labor force participation among married women in urban China, 1991–2011?

Since the advent of Communist movement in the 1940s, women in China have been portrayed as equal partners to men in their labor force participation, operating under slogans such as “Women hold up half the sky”. Political rhetoric in the Mao era suggested that gender parity could be attained through women's participation in paid employment and full time work outside the home became routine for most urban women. Subsequent to the reforms, however, China has experienced a sharp decline in urban women's labor force participation. Utilizing micro-level data spanning from 1991 to 2011, individual women's labor force decisions are analyzed in order to identify the reasons for the decline. Changes in covariates explain only a small portion of the observed decline. However, over the study interval the wage returns to education increased markedly, and the distribution of wages widened considerably. These factors, combined with a high wage elasticity of participation, are consistent with the pattern of declining labor force participation found in the data. As such, promotion of women's education, particularly at the upper secondary level and beyond, could be expected to offset the downward trend.     

Labor productivity, wages, nationality, and foreign ownership shares in Thai manufacturing, 1996–2000

This paper compares labor productivity and wages among nationality and ownership groups of foreign multinational corporations (MNCs) and local plants in Thai manufacturing for 1996, 1998, and 2000. Disaggregating foreign MNCs by nationality or foreign ownership share revealed a few significant differences in both labor productivity and wages that were not present in more aggregate specifications. In these cases, there was a weak tendency for MNCs from Europe, Japan, and the United States to have relatively high labor productivity and wages, for wholly-foreign MNCs to have relatively high labor productivity, and for majority- and wholly-foreign MNCs to pay relatively high wages. However, these results suggest that the relationships among labor productivity or wages, on the one hand, and nationality or foreign ownership shares, on the other hand, were generally weak in Thai manufacturing. These results are also consistent with those of previous studies in suggesting that the relationship between labor productivity and foreign ownership in general was also rather weak, though the relationship between wages and foreign ownership was somewhat stronger.