Wage inequality,segregation by skill and the price of capital in an assignment model

Some pieces of empirical evidence suggest that in the U.S., from the 1970s to the 1990s, (i) wage inequality between-plants rose much more than wage inequality within-plants and (ii) there was an increase in the segregation of workers by skill into separate plants. This paper presents a frictionless assignment model in which these two features can be explained simultaneously as the result of the decline in the relative price of capital. Additional implications of the model regarding the skill premium and the dispersion in labor productivity across plants are also consistent with the empirical evidence. The model permits to consider changes in the skill distribution too. Combining these changes with falling capital prices provides a more comprehensive view of the overall trend of wage inequality and of workers' segregation by skill in the data, and it helps explaining some episodes of decreasing wage inequality.     

Endogenous skill heterogeneity and inflation

This paper examines the implications of ex ante skill heterogeneity for long run inflation. We develop a dynamic general equilibrium model in which there are two types of labor (skilled and unskilled), two types of capital (human and physical), and money is introduced via a cash in advance constraint on consumption purchases. Skill heterogeneity is characterized in terms of (i) a parameter governing the ease with which the two types of labor can be substituted for each other in production; and (ii) the “productivity” of human capital in the production of skill. The model includes the accumulation of human capital which in turn creates skill heterogeneity among workers through an efficiency wage mechanism. Numerical experiments indicate that there is a range of parameter estimates in which the Friedman Rule may not be optimal. Furthermore, our quantitative experiments also indicate that there is a range of parameter values in which a greater degree of skill heterogeneity may be associated with a greater preference for inflation. Empirically, we also find that the inflation and heterogeneity correlation is positive.     

Optimal marginal and average income taxation under maximin

Using the Mirrlees optimal income tax model under maximin, we derive fairly mild conditions for a decreasing marginal tax rate throughout the skill distribution with no bunching, a strictly concave tax function in income and a single-peaked average tax schedule. Assuming additive preferences and an isoelastic disutility of labor function, these tax profiles are implied by aggregate skills that are non-decreasing with the skill level. If preferences are quasilinear in leisure or in consumption, these tax profiles are also obtained under a large set of skill distributions.     

Monopolistic supply of sorting,inequality, and welfare

Why is an increase in income inequality often accompanied by an increase in socioeconomic segregation? And what are the welfare implications of this comovement? This paper uses a theoretical model to analyze the relationship between income inequality and socioeconomic segregation. It shows that rising inequality can trigger sorting according to income, as a monopolist's profits from offering sorting increase with income inequality. It also examines the relationship between sorting and social welfare and shows that profit-maximizing sorting patterns are not necessarily optimal from a welfare perspective. In fact, for a broad field of income distributions (monopolist) profits increase with inequality, while at the same time total welfare from sorting decreases.     

PUBLIC GOOD PROVISION AND THE COMPARATIVE STATICS OF OPTIMAL NONLINEAR INCOME TAXATION*

Comparative static properties of the solution to an optimal nonlinear income tax problem are provided for a model in which the government both designs an income tax schedule for redistributive purposes and provides a public good optimally. There are two types of individuals, distinguished by their skill levels, who have the same quasilinear preferences for labor supply and the consumption of a private and a public good. Comparative statics are obtained for the weights in a weighted utilitarian social welfare function, the prices of the two goods, a taste parameter that measures the onerousness of working, and the skill levels.     

Statistical Discrimination with Peer Effects: Can Integration Eliminate Negative Stereotypes?

We introduce peer effects in the costs of human capital acquisition into a model of statistical discrimination in labour markets. This creates a link between the level of segregation in social networks and racial disparities in job assignment and wages. We show that this relationship is characterized by discontinuities: there is a threshold level of segregation below which negative stereotypes become unsustainable, and steady-state skill levels can change dramatically. This change can work in either direction: skill levels may either rise or fall in both groups. Which of these outcomes arises depends on the population share of the disadvantaged group and on the distribution of the costs of human capital investments. We also examine the effects of affirmative action policies in the presence of peer effects and provide conditions under which such policies eliminate negative stereotypes.     

Clubs,local public goods and transportation models: A synthesis

Clubs, local public goods, and transportation models are analyzed within a unified model. The emphasis is on the derivation of optimal allocation, pricing and the size of the sharing group. We derive the conditions under which optimal prices will yield surplus or deficit, as well as those under which competitive provision will be efficient. Given heterogeneous tastes we prove that segregation according to tastes is generally efficient although several cases where this result does not hold are also discussed. We show that the existing literature is unnecessarily restrictive and that the unified approach suggested here considerably extends the existing analysis of clubs' local public goods and the transportation problems.     

Optimal Nonlinear Income Taxation with Habit Formation

It has recently been shown that incorporating “keeping up with the Joneses” preferences into a prototypical two‐ability‐type optimal nonlinear income tax model leads to higher marginal tax rates for both types of agents. In particular, the high‐skill type faces a positive marginal tax rate, rather than zero as in the conventional case. In this paper, agents’ utility functions are postulated to exhibit “habit formation in consumption” such that the prototypical two‐ability‐type optimal nonlinear income tax model becomes a dynamic analytical framework. We show that if the government can commit to its future fiscal policy, the presence of consumption habits does not affect the standard results on optimal marginal tax rates. By contrast, if the government cannot precommit, the high‐skill type will face a negative marginal tax rate, while the low‐skill type’s marginal tax rate remains positive.     

知识产权保护与“南方”国家的自主创新激励

本文构建了一个扩展的具有自主创新的南北产品周期模型,讨论了知识产权保护对南方自主创新的激励效应以及南北双方的总体影响。本文发现,严格的知识产权保护对南方自主创新的激励效应以及南北双方的总体效应依赖于南方的初始技能劳动水平和北方创新性质导致的市场结构。在垂直创新的寡头市场,严格的知识产权保护对南方自主创新没有激励效应,它对南北双方都造成伤害;在水平创新的垄断竞争市场,当南方技能劳动短缺时,严格知识产权保护在短期有利于南北双方,但并不激励南方自主创新。当南方技能劳动充裕时,适度的知识产权保护会激励南方的自主创新,并在长期对南北双方都有利。研究发现,南方存在一个最优知识产权保护强度,其依赖南方的技能水平以及市场的竞争程度。     

Social Preferences, Skill Segregation, and Wage Dynamics

We study the earning structure and the equilibrium assignment of workers to firms in a model in which workers have social preferences, and skills are perfectly substitutable in production. Firms offer long-term contracts, and we allow for frictions in the labour market in the form of mobility costs. The model delivers specific predictions about the nature of worker flows, about the characteristics of workplace skill segregation, and about wage dispersion both within and across firms. We show that long-term contracts in the presence of social preferences associate within-firm wage dispersion with novel "internal labour market" features such as gradual promotions, productivity-unrelated wage increases, and downward wage flexibility. These three dynamic features lead to productivity-unrelated wage volatility within firms.     

Occupational Sex Segregation —Increasing or Decreasing?*

Contrary to previous findings, the new index of sex segregation derived in this study suggests that sex segregation in the Australian workforce has been increasing. A decomposition of this new index indicates that the main reason for the increase is the increasing share of employment held by females. The decomposition also considers a number of aspects of occupations including growth rates, skill levels and gender domination.     

Minorities and Endogenous Segregation

A theoretical analysis is proposed of segregation as an equilibrium phenomenon in a random-matching model of the marriage market. Otherwise identical partners possess a pay-off-irrelevant characteristic, colour. We derive the set of colour-blind equilibria and show that they are generically constrained inefficient. Equilibrium segregation strategies are strategies that condition actions on the type of match. It is shown that distributions of types exist such that segregation equilibrium pay-offs Pareto dominate colour-blind pay-offs. For other distributions, segregation also generates conflict, where the majority unambiguously gains, while the minority group may lose. Giving preferential treatment, that is, minority bias, can increase overall welfare.     

人工智能技术对制造业资本溢价与技能溢价影响的区域异质性研究

人工智能技术会影响资本溢价和技能溢价的观点在国际上已经达成共识,但没有形成统一的研究结论。在我国劳动收入份额持续走低的形势下,有必要探讨人工智能技术对资本溢价和技能溢价带来的影响。文章聚焦我国制造业,构建资本溢价和技能溢价的内生模型,数理演绎人工智能技术对二者的影响机制,并根据我国情势分别对人工智能技术应用先发地区和后发地区的资本溢价和技能溢价走势提出命题,基于我国制造业1993-2019年的省际数据,应用四方程标准化供给面系统法进行了实证检验,进一步地,区分先发地区和后发地区对人工智能技术影响资本溢价和技能溢价的直接效应和偏效应进行了回归分析。研究结果表明：先发地区资本溢价呈微降趋势,技能溢价呈现显著极化态势；后发地区资本溢价呈上升趋势,技能溢价处于”U”型低谷区。相较于后发地区,先发地区资本溢价和技能溢价对人工智能技术的反应更敏感、作用效果更强,且人工智能技术可以通过要素结构、技术效率结构缓解资本溢价水平；人工智能技术可以通过劳动结构、技能效率结构增强技能溢价水平。     

中国货币政策与财政政策协调机制的均衡分析 ——基于非线性结构模型系统

为探究货币财政政策在既定宏观经济目标下政策协调的最优均衡策略,本文引入内生的政府支出政策,并基于非线性利率及财政赤字率作用的货币供应量方程构建非线性结构模型.进一步地,对包含内生政策的非线性结构模型进行对数线性化处理与参数校准,并基于既定预期目标研究货币政策与财政政策的协调问题.特别地,对2008年和2017年进行了政策均衡模拟分析.通过模拟分析可以发现,当经济出现较大波动时,采用本文模型可以得到满足均衡情况的实际利率和财政赤字率的最优政策组合,与我国当前实际经济采取的政策组合较为一致.     

The impact of changing skill levels on optimal nonlinear income taxes

The impact of changing an individual's skill level on the solution to a finite population version of the Mirrlees optimal nonlinear income tax problem with quasilinear-in-leisure preferences is investigated. It is shown that it is possible to sign the directions of change in everyone's optimal consumptions and optimal marginal tax rates in response to such a change.     

The optimal taxation of unskilled labor with job search and social assistance

In order to explore the optimal taxation of low-skilled labor, we extend the standard model of optimal nonlinear income taxation in the presence of quasi-linear preferences in leisure by allowing for involuntary unemployment, job search and an exogenous welfare benefit. In trading off low-skilled employment against work effort of higher skilled workers, the government balances distortions on the search margin with those on work effort. Higher welfare benefits typically reduce taxes paid by low-skilled workers and raise marginal tax rates throughout the skill distribution.     

SPECIALIZATION AND THE SKILL PREMIUM IN THE 20TH CENTURY*

The skill premium fell substantially in the first part of the 20th century and then rose at the end of the century. I argue that these changes are connected to the organization of production. When production is organized into large plants, jobs become routinized, favoring less‐skilled workers. A model is introduced that parameterizes capital's ability to do many tasks, that is, capital's flexibility. When calibrated to data on the distribution of plant sizes, the model can account for between half and two‐thirds of the movement in the skill premium over the century.     

Optimal nonlinear taxation of income and savings without commitment

When a government is unable to commit to its future tax policies, information about taxpayers' characteristics revealed by their behavior may be used to extract more taxes from them in the future. We examine the implications of this ratchet effect for the design of redistributive income and savings tax policies in a two‐period model with two types of individuals who only differ in their skill levels. When commitment is not possible, it may be optimal to separate, pool, or partially pool different types in period one. The nature of the distortions to labor supplies and savings are investigated for each of these three regimes. The identification of the optimal regime is investigated numerically.     

Risky human capital and deferred capital income taxation

We study the structure of optimal wedges and capital taxes in a dynamic Mirrlees economy with endogenous distribution of skills. Human capital is a private, stochastic state variable that drives the skill process of each individual. Building on the findings of the labor literature, we construct a tractable life-cycle model of human capital evolution with risky investment and stochastic depreciation. In this setting, we demonstrate the optimality of (a) a human capital premium, i.e., an excess return on human capital relative to physical capital, (b) a large intertemporal wedge early in the life-cycle, and (c) a non-zero intratemporal wedge even at the top of the skill distribution at all dates except the last date in the life-cycle. The main implication for the structure of optimal linear capital taxes is the necessity of deferred taxation of physical capital. The average marginal tax rate on physical capital held in every period is zero in present value. However, expected capital tax payments do not equal zero in every period. Necessarily, agents face negative expected capital tax payments early in the life-cycle and positive expected capital tax payments late in the life-cycle.     

Skill‐biased heterogeneous firms,trade liberalization and the skill premium

We propose a theory that rising globalization and rising wage inequality are related because trade liberalization raises the demand facing highly competitive skill‐intensive firms. In our model, only the lowest‐cost firms participate in the global economy exactly along the lines of Melitz ( 2003 ). In addition to differing in their productivity, firms differ in their skill intensity. We model skill‐biased technology as a correlation between skill intensity and technological acumen, and we estimate this correlation to be large using firm‐level data from Chile in 1995. A fall in trade costs leads to both greater trade volumes and an increase in the relative demand for skill, as the lowest‐cost/most‐skilled firms expand to serve the export market while less skill‐intensive non‐exporters retrench in the face of increased import competition. This mechanism works regardless of factor endowment differences, so we provide an explanation for why globalization and wage inequality move together in both skill‐abundant and skill‐scarce countries. In our model countries are net exporters of the services of their abundant factor, but there are no Stolper‐Samuelson effects because import competition affects all domestic firms equally.