Endowments vs. market potential: What explains the relocation of industry after the Polish reunification in 1918?

How did the location of industry across interwar Poland react to the Polish reunification? After more than 120 years of political and economic separation, Poland was reunified at the end of 1918. In consequence, the removal of internal tariff barriers and improved infrastructure strengthened the domestic market, while foreign market relations were cut off. Similarly, the geographical distribution of factor endowments was changed, for example, through internal migration. How did these forces interact to determine the location of industry? We survey the dynamics of industrial location between 1902 and 1925-1937 and estimate a specification that nests market potential and comparative advantage to quantify their respective impact during the interwar years. The results point to a role for both, comparative advantage and access to markets. We show that both statistically and economically the most important factors were the endowment with skilled labour and inter-industry-linkages.     

Female salaries and careers in British banking, 1915–41

Women were first employed in large numbers by the British banking industry during the First World War, and were an essential part of the industry's labour force thereafter. During the interwar period, women were often confined to routine back office positions, and could not advance past the level of clerk. Evidence from Williams Deacon's Bank shows that the salaries of younger women were very similar to their male counterparts; however, an ever-widening gender pay gap emerged after about 5 years seniority. The main reasons for this pay gap were higher exit rates for women, largely due to marriage bars, and lower returns to seniority. Promotion restrictions, though ubiquitous, account for a relatively small proportion of the gender pay gap. Despite the pay gap, the marriage bar, and the lack of promotion opportunities, a sizable proportion of female clerks were very loyal to the Bank and remained for 10 or more years. This was due to the absence of better opportunities elsewhere in the labour market.     

安徽省建筑劳务输出的现状及对策

安徽是我国人口大省之一,做为欠发达地区和农业大省,每年约有1800万剩余劳动力亟需寻求出路。近年来,安徽省劳务输出发展强劲,尤其是具有传统优势的建筑劳务输出规模迅速扩大,对解决农村富余劳动力具有重要意义。本文从人力资源和市场管理的理论出发,结合实际工作经验,通过比     

A model of the Dutch labour market (AMO-K)

Summary So far, the labour market has not received any special attention from macro-econometric model builders. In this article an attempt has been made to describe the labour market in detail, paying attention to such important phenomena as the friction between labour supply and demand, the heterogeneity of labour, the dependence of labour supply on the labour-market situation, the Phillips mechanism and the impact of real wages on labour demand. To make it suitable for policy simulations, the model has been extended to a complete macro-econometric model, taking account of the fact that both labour and capital limit the production possibilities.This paper summarises an extensive Dutch report on the construction of a model for the Netherlands labour market. The title of the original report is AMO-K: Een arbeidsmarktmodel met twee categorieën arbeid; (AMO-K, A labour-market model with two categories of labour) ; it was published by the Netherlands Economic Institute (NEI) in Rotterdam in the so-called Olive Series, 1982-2, pp. 403ff. Some details of the model presented in that report were changed after its publication; see G. den Broeder, AMO-K 81-12, Tussenrapport betreffende de verdere ontwikkeling van het arbeidsmarktmodel (Interim report on the further development of the labourmarket model), Rotterdam, September 1983. Since then, only minor changes have been carried through. The model reproduced in this paper is the modified version. The model was developed within the National Programme of Labour-Market Research (NPAO) (now defunct), the NPAO organisation having granted a commission to the NEI in Rotterdam.     

What Happened to European Unemployment?

Summary  Many academic papers were still being written on mass unemployment in Europe. While, unemployment in the EU15 was falling dramatically. Not only academics, but also European workers at large did not seem to appreciate these labour market developments. I offer two explanations for this puzzling deterioration of workers perceptions of the labour market in spite of disappearing unemployment: (i) labour market risk increased, and (ii) employment growth occurred at the cost of stagnating labour productivity. This means that the new labour market offers a worse risk-return combination. Strategies to address these issues are discussed in the final section of the paper. This paper provides an extended version of the first Willem F. Duisenberg Lecture, held at the University of Amsterdam on February 28, 2008. I am particularly grateful to NIAS for this opportunity and to Petry Kievit for having greatly improved my English.     

Labour hoarding in a disequilibrium model of the Dutch labour market

Summary This paper presents a method to integrate labour hoarding into a disequilibrium model of the labour market. Disequilibrium indicators for the labour market that include labour hoarding are constructed. These indicators, being important determinants of policy multipliers with respect to employment, are found to be less volatile than the corresponding disequilibrium indicators for the goods market which are available from business surveys. The lower volatility reflects the role of labour hoarding as a buffer between actual and efficient employment levels. Our results indicate that labour hoarding in Dutch enterprises ranges from a minimum of 0.5 per cent of employment in early 1985 to a maximum of 7.0 per cent in 1975. Furthermore, the paper pays special attention to the modelling of mismatch unemployment and to the simulation results of an empirical disequilibrium macromodel of the Dutch economy.The authors thank M.M.G. Fase and two anonymous referees for their useful comments.     

Australian Labour Market Institutions Through Time: A Perspective from the New Institutional Economics

One of the distinguishing characteristics of the Australian economy over most of the past century has been its labour market institutions and organizations. Recently these institutions have changed to become more decentralized. Douglas North has argued that examining and explaining institutional change through time is an important and comparatively unresearched topic facing economic historians. In this paper, changes to Australia's labour market institutions are examined from the perspective of the New Institutional Economics. Following North, it is argued that further research should be directed to identifying the role ideological beliefs have played in shaping Australia's labour market institutions over time.     

Impact of employment protection legislation on employment and exporting in select African countries

Labour market flexibility is an important issue in both development and labour economics. More flexibility in the labour market is believed to facilitate job creation, but also makes it easy for employers to terminate employment contracts and may be in conflict with the notion of decent jobs as promoted by the International Labour Organization and workers' unions. It is therefore not surprising that labour market flexibility or inflexibility has received a lot of attention in the extant literature. Using a sample of about 4700 firms from six African countries, we investigate the impact of restrictive labour regulation on a number of economic outcomes and find that more restrictive labour market regulations are detrimental to export propensity, export intensity, investment and employment. Policy-makers must be cautious, however, when implementing employment regulations as too flexible regulations may benefit employers at the expense of employees.     

Women's labour force participation in nineteenth-century England and Wales: evidence from the 1881 census enumerators’ books

This article uses a new source of data, namely the full sample of the 1881 census enumerators’ books, to study female labour force participation. It examines the interaction between labour demand and supply to gauge their relative importance in determining female labour force participation rates (LFPRs). Three main findings emerge from the current article. First, there is an unmistakable link between labour demand and female LFPRs. High levels of female labour force participation are found in areas where there were industries with ample demand for female labour. Second, supply-side factors also had clear effects on female LFPRs. However, they can only operate within the limit imposed by the demand-side conditions. Third, female migration did not fundamentally change the spatial patterns of female LFPRs. Overall, this article argues that the demand side of the female labour market was the most important factor in determining female LFPRs in nineteenth-century England and Wales.     

EEN Actief Arbeidsniarktbeleid

Summary The period following the second world war was characterised in The Netherlands by full employment. As a result, the policy with regard to the labour market underwent some remarkable changes. Before the war, the principal aim of that policy had been the prevention of unemployment. Now far more stress is being laid on the creation of a state of equilibrium between the various parts of the market. At the same time, because people became more aware of the fact that economic policy in general should be directed towards attaining a high rate of economic growth, another new element was introduced into labour market policy. It was felt to an increasingly strong extent that such policy should also be made to serve the purpose of attaining an optimal use of the available and potential labour force.The author is of opinion that labour market policy should be a matter of co-operation between government and socialeconomic organisations, and the entrepreneurs. It should start at the level of general and professional education, and take into account that the present phase of economic development shows important shifts. Agricultural employment in The Netherlands is narrowing down from 8% of the total working population at present, to probably 6% in 1970. Employment in manufacturing is levelling off at a percentage of around 42. This means that employment in the tertiary sector is surpassing 50%. An active labour market policy should be part of a program of general economic planning at middle-long term, and include a policy, directed towards establishing a higher rate of mobility of labour. Co-ordination of an active labour market policy with other sectors of socio-economic policy could be reached by the creation of governmental or semi-governmental bodies, designed to give special attention to the optimal use of the labour force as a factor of production, with due regard to the human element.Referaat gehouden voor de jaarlijkse bijeenkomst van de Vereniging van Afgestudeerden der N.E.H. te Rotterdam, op 17 Mei 1967.     

区域市场的行政整合与经济增长

随着城市化进程的推进,行政区划调整逐渐成为区域经济整合的一种重要方式。现有文献多从财政分权和官员晋升竞争等角度解释我国区域发展,较少分析行政整合对地区发展的作用和影响。本文以2003年广东佛山"撤市建区"行政区划调整作为案例,采用合成控制法进行了实证分析,评估了行政整合对地区发展的重要影响。本文的发现表明地区内部行政区划调整能够实现市场整合,优化内部资源配置,加快地方经济增长。这为我国地级层面近年出现的"撤市建区"行政区划调整现象提供了一个经济学上的解释。     

Averting the construction skills crisis: a regional approach

The East Midlands construction industry is currently suffering from a severe skills shortage across its craft, professional and managerial occupations. The lack of available capacity within the regional labour market coupled with the poor image of the sector, call into question the industry's ability to cope with the levels of new orders and output growth predicted over the next few years. In this paper, it is argued that the casualised nature of the industry's labour market has rendered national, 'top-down' labour market policy measures ineffective in addressing the industry's skills concerns. This hypothesis has been explored through research that canvassed the opinions of key industry stakeholders as to the actions necessary to avert the region's skills crisis. This was achieved through a series of focus groups and workshops involving over 150 individuals with a vested interest in the region's construction skills situation. The insights emerging from the analysis suggested that bespoke regional and sub-regional labour market policies are required to avert the current skills shortage. The recommendations provided by the participants were used as the basis for a strategic package of measures that are currently being implemented across the region's five counties. This strategy aims to join-up hitherto disparate labour market measures within a single centrally coordinated framework. Nevertheless, overcoming the industry's fragmented structure remains an obstacle to resolving successfully the East Midlands' construction skills shortage.     

Promotions in the internal labor market: New evidence from China

Using unique personnel data from a firm in China, we analyze promotions in an internal labor market. Specifically, we explore the firm's hierarchy and promotion patterns as well as the relationship between promotions and compensation. Unlike previous works, we focus on promotions throughout the firm's hierarchy including rank-and-files and promotions across branches. By doing so, we hope to shed new light on the black box of a firm's internal hiring and promotion practices and improve understanding of the internal labor market.     

香港制造业升级的障碍分析

本文探讨了近年香港制造业升级困难的两个主要原因:大陆的无限廉价劳动力的利用和自由放任的经济政策。由此给出建议:适当的政府干预必不可少。     

Education and the labour market in Botswana

Using primary data from a 1993/4 Household Income and Expenditure Survey in Botswana, this article presents empirical results on occupational attainment, its determinants, and the extent of filtering down in Botswana's labour market, given changes in labour market conditions over time. It was found that the Botswana labour market has been characterised by some ‘filtering down’ of educated workers into less skilled jobs as the supply of skilled manpower exceeded demand. Those who entered the labour market earlier, those with more education, those located in the urban areas and male workers are more likely to occupy jobs that are higher up in the hierarchy than to be in an unskilled blue-collar job. Jobs higher up in the hierarchy are also more rewarding financially. The article shows that there is occupational segregation of workers by gender in Botswana's labour market in that female workers are generally confined to a narrow range of occupations. The policy implications are that employment creation has to be pursued vigorously and the issue of gender discrimination investigated further.     

Women's work and structural change: occupational structure in eighteenth‐century Spain

This article uses the declarations of householders in the Cadaster of Ensenada (1750–5) to calculate labour participation rates for women and men from 22 localities in inland Spain. The article establishes the actual levels of women's market activity, which are much higher than commonly assumed. This unique source also makes it possible to analyse the region's occupational structure. Due to the labour‐intensive character of manufacturing work, the abundant supply of cheap labour, the diffusion of cottage industries, and the demand for commodities from internal and colonial markets, a large portion of the region's population worked in manufactures in the eighteenth century. This finding challenges standard interpretations of the Spanish economy at this time as mostly agricultural, which rely on sources that exclude women workers. Most workers in the manufacturing sector were women, and their market activity was concentrated in textile manufacturing. Once women are included in the analyses, the industrial share of employment follows a U‐shaped trajectory from the eighteenth century to the twentieth century. The article concludes that the standard interpretation of structural change, based solely on empirical evidence for male workers, gives a misleading picture of when, where, why, and how structural change occurred.     

中国劳动力市场发育的制度经济学分析

本文分析了中国劳动力市场发育的结构特征,并对转型期中国劳动力市场分割的制度变迁和制度均衡进行了分析,认为制度非均衡已成为中国劳动力市场发育的一种“常态”。中国劳动力市场的制度非均衡又成为该市场制度变迁的诱致因素,它的轨迹也就是劳动力市场制度变迁的轨迹。     

From the substance to the shadow: the role of the court in Japanese labour markets

Modern contract law generally does not allow property rights or similar claims to be made against employees. This undermines a claim on the return on the employer's investments in recruiting and training a worker, making them vulnerable to possible infringement from a bystander. Accordingly, employers’ investment in recruiting and training might become deficient. Therefore, protecting an employer's investment, balanced against the mobility of the labour market for better employer/employee matches, has emerged as an issue during the transition towards a market‐based economy. This article explores how the Japanese state court in its early period addressed this issue in the tight labour market of the silk‐reeling industry, which was the leading industry at that time. Initially, the court directly protected the interests of employers whose employees were poached, at the expense of workers’ mobility. Then, it seemed to govern transactions between employers indirectly as a shadow off‐the‐equilibrium path. Thus, an employer whose employee was poached and an employer who carried out the poaching would privately negotiate to settle the dispute, using a possible suit as a threat against the poacher. An examination of the suits that were actually filed supports this hypothesis. This indirect governance facilitated labour market mobility with some protection of the original employer's claim.     

Job Creation and Destruction in South Africa

Analysts of the South African labour market have mainly used household surveys to analyse the labour market. It has been more difficult to explore the labour demand of firms, as a result of limited data availability. We use the Quarterly Employment Statistics survey, an enterprise survey conducted by Statistics South Africa, to explore how South African firms create and destroy jobs, thereby shedding light on many of the policy questions that are relevant in a high unemployment society like South Africa. We find that job creation and destruction rates are similar to those found in Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development countries. There is little evidence that labour legislation creates rigidities that prevent firms from hiring or firing workers. We also find that larger firms are better net creators of jobs than small firms and that net job creation rates are negative in manufacturing. Our research has important policy implications – particularly for the South African National Planning Commission's 2030 plan, in which new jobs are envisaged to come mainly from small‐ and medium‐sized firms. Our research suggests that this scenario is not likely without changes to policy or legislation.     

Structural change in China: the role of factor market distortions

This paper proposes a systematic accounting framework to decompose the reallocation of labour out of agriculture into factor market distortions and market-driven forces. The findings are twofold. First, the removal of factor market distortions is a dominant driving force of the structural change in China in the last decades, which contributes 50.52%, and market-driven forces account for the rest 49.48%. Second, the contribution of market-driven forces has been increasing with the deepening of market-oriented reforms, while the impact of the removal of factor market distortions has been decreasing especially along with the slowdown of labour market reforms after China joined the WTO in 2001. The results imply that further reforms that aim at correcting factor market distortions could still be an important impetus of structural change in the future.