Does Having a Dysfunctional Personality Hurt Your Career? Axis II Personality Disorders and Labor Market Outcomes

Despite recent interest in how psychiatric disorders affect work outcomes, little is known about the role of personality disorders (PDs), which are poorly understood yet prevalent (15%) and impairing. We used nationally representative data for 12,457 men and 16,061 women to examine associations of PDs with any employment, full-time employment, chronic unemployment, being fired or laid off, and having trouble with a boss or co-worker. Antisocial, paranoid, and obsessive-compulsive PDs demonstrated the broadest patterns of associations with adverse outcomes. Findings suggest that PDs may have implications for the productivity of co-workers as well as that of the disordered employees themselves.     

How Does China's New Labour Contract Law Affect Floating Workers?

China's new Labour Contract Law took effect in January 2008 and required firms to give migrant workers written contracts, strengthened labour protections for workers and contained penalties for firms that did not follow the labour code. This article uses survey data of migrant workers in the Pearl River Delta before and after the law, and a retrospective question on when workers received their first labour contract to assess the effects of the law on labour outcomes. The evidence shows that the new law increased the percentage of migrant workers with written contracts, which in turn raised social insurance coverage, reduced the likelihood of wage arrears and raised the likelihood that workers had a union at their workplace.     

Does an Entrepreneurial Career Pay for Women in China?

Using data from the Chinese Household Income Project survey in 2013, our male–female pay‐gap decomposition illustrates that the gender earnings gap is larger among the self‐employed than the wage‐employed after controlling for the effect of various pay‐determining characteristics. Our self‐employed versus wage‐employed decomposition also controls for selection into self‐employment as well as those pay‐determining characteristics. We find that wage‐employed women would earn less than their current earnings if they shifted to self‐employment, while wage‐employed men would earn more than their current earnings if they became self‐employed. In essence, self‐employed women suffer from double jeopardy. They not only earn less than men in self‐employment due to lower returns for the same pay‐determining characteristics, but women in self‐employment also earn less than women in wage employment when they have the same pay‐determining characteristics.     

Do Women Ask?

Females typically earn less than males. The reasons are not fully understood. This paper re‐examines the idea that women “don't ask,” which potentially assigns part of the responsibility for the gender pay gap onto female behavior. Such an account cannot readily be tested with standard datasets. This paper is the first to be able to use matched employer–employee data in which workers are questioned about their asking behavior. It concludes that males and females ask equally often for promotions and raises. The paper's empirical results suggest, however, that while women do now ask they “don't get.”     

Does Homeownership Prolong the Duration of Unemployment?

We examine the effects of homeownership on individuals' unemployment durations. An unemployment spell can terminate with a job or with nonparticipation. The endogeneity of homeownership is addressed by estimating a full maximum likelihood function jointly modeling the competing hazards and the probability of being a homeowner. Unobserved factors contributing to the probability of being a homeowner are allowed to be correlated with unobservable heterogeneity in the hazard rates. Not controlling for ownership selection, there is neither a significant difference in the job‐finding hazard nor in the nonparticipation hazard of unemployed owners and renters. If we jointly model the ownership selection, we find that unemployed homeowners are more likely to find a job than renters.     

Does ICT investment widen the growth gap?

This paper builds a model of cumulative growth to examine the dynamic interdependent relationship between Information and Communication Technology (ICT) investment and economic growth for a sample of 29 countries in the 1990s. We confirm the following facts: First, there is a positive correlation between ICT investment and economic growth. Second, non-ICT investment has as much influence on the growth gap as ICT investment. Third, those countries with a solid economic infrastructure and open trade regime experience more active ICT investments. Fourth, those countries with a comparatively lower productivity level can reduce the gap using knowledge spillovers from more advanced countries. Fifth, reinforcement of patent rights has a positive influence on economic growth by stimulating the accumulation of ICT capital. Finally, ICT investment does not have a strong interdependent relationship with economic growth, while non-ICT investment has a cumulative causal relationship with economic growth and plays a key role in the process of widening the growth gap.     

Does the welfare regime impact the telework gender stress gap?

After decades of slow diffusion, the acceptance of telework has dramatically accelerated during the pandemic crisis, becoming a mainstream work practice. However, little is still known on the impact of telework design on employee stress, particularly when stress is high due to a major health crisis, at a time when it is crucial that organizations help buffer it. Using the welfare regime literature, we study the effects of telework demands/resources factors on stress and the moderating effects of gender in more or less egalitarian welfare regimes, during a pandemic crisis. Analyzing data collected from 4602 respondents in France and Quebec, we find that telework demands (family interference with work, organizational isolation, emotional isolation) impact stress positively in both welfare regimes. We also find that the gender stress gap is higher in a more gender-inegalitarian welfare regime than in a more gender-egalitarian welfare regime. Men's and women's stress is not impacted in the same manner in the two contexts studies. Contributions to research and practice are discussed, along with limitations and potential future research avenues.     

Contract research today: Where do we stand?

New insights of empirical studies in contract research do not always conform to those that might be expected as a result of these theoretical studies. Much of the research into the nature and form of contracts has been of a theoretical nature and it is often referred as ‘relational contract’ or ‘incomplete contract’ theory. In comparison, a limited number of empirical studies have been undertaken. This paper will set out the findings of these two major streams of theoretical analysis of contracts and then contrast them with recent empirical research into ‘framework contracts’.     

Oust the Louse: Does Political Pressure Discipline Regulators?

Remaining in office is a potential motivator for regulatory decisions by public utility commissioners. We examine regulatory exit, where a regulator leaves a U.S. state commission during a term or is not re‐appointed/re‐elected. We find that higher electricity prices lead to ousting, ousting is less common where it is more costly for the principal to whom the regulator reports, and ousting is more likely where regulators are more accountable or are more likely to share the principal's preferences. Regulatory exit does not appear to be due mainly to the revolving door. Ousting also appears to lower future electricity prices.     

Who wants the Contrat de Travail Unique? Social Support for Labor Market Flexibilization in France

In France, a proposal was made to substitute a unique labor contract with a degree of employment protection increasing with tenure to the existing open‐end and fixed‐term contracts. Using survey data, this paper analyzes the social support for this contrat de travail unique (CTU). Contrary to the prediction of insider/outsider theories, support for the CTU comes from insider groups, whereas most outsider groups oppose it. This result may be the consequence of the job protection increasing with tenure. This mechanism could reinforce certain types of market segmentation instead of abolishing employment precariousness.     

Does ICTs decrease the spread of informal economy in Africa?

This paper assesses the effect of information and communication technologies (ICTs) on the informal economy. We applied the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) on a sample of 45 African countries from 2000 to 2017. According to the findings, the use of ICTs (mobile phone and internet) decreases the spread of the informal economy in Africa. These results are robust to a battery of robustness checks. Furthermore, the results of the mediation analysis show that the effect of ICTs on the informal economy is mediated by financial development, human capital and control of corruption. From a policy perspective, we suggest a quantitative and qualitative consolidation of technological infrastructures, for a sustainable mitigation of the rise of informal sector in Africa.     

Does the use of knowledge integration mechanisms enhance product innovativeness?

This study draws upon the perspectives of organizational learning and environmental contingency to investigate how the use of knowledge integration mechanisms affects product innovativeness under different levels of technological turbulence, market turbulence, and competitive intensity. Based on a sample of 102 high-tech product projects, hierarchical moderated regression analyses reveal that product innovativeness is related to knowledge integration mechanisms in a curvilinear manner under different levels of competitive intensity, market turbulence, and technological turbulence. Specifically, under a low level of competitive intensity, market turbulence and technological turbulence, the relationship between knowledge integration mechanisms and product innovativeness is an inverted U-shape. By contrast, under a high level of competitive intensity, market turbulence, and technological turbulence, product innovativeness is related to knowledge integration mechanisms in a U-shaped manner.     

Does Deregulation Work? Reassessing the Unemployment Effects of Employment Protection

Using new data, this article examines the effect of employment protection legislation (EPL) on aggregate and youth unemployment in advanced economies and Central and Eastern Europe during 1980–2009. The results offer no clear support for the argument that EPL is a cause of unemployment. Although EPL reaches statistical significance at conventional levels in some models, the results are sensitive to small changes in the sample or the use of alternative estimators. While the analysis suggests some scope for complementary reforms of EPL and the tax wedge in tackling youth unemployment, the findings on the whole indicate that government efforts to tackle unemployment by deregulating EPL alone may well be futile.     

Does competition increase quality? Evidence from the US airline industry

This paper studies the impact of competition on quality provision in the US airline industry exploiting a novel source of exogenous variation in competition. While mergers among market incumbents may stifle competition, a merger may increase the probability of entry if the merging airlines were not operating prior to merger in the market but each of them had presence at different route endpoints. We find non-merging incumbent airlines increase their flight frequency upon entry threat and accommodate entry of the newly merged airline by lowering flight frequency upon entry. While non-merging incumbents reduced arrival delays only upon entry of the newly merged airline, we find that incumbents decrease their cancelation rates and departure delays both upon merger announcement and entry of the newly merged airline. Our evidence suggests an increase in competition may increase consumer surplus, because non-merging incumbents increase quality and convenience, while keeping their prices unchanged.     

From Internal to Network Labor Markets? Insights on New Promotion Processes from the Call Center Industry

Research on network forms of organization suggests that “business units” may be a more useful analytical unit than “firms” in understanding restructuring of internal labor markets. We find evidence for this proposition by analyzing promotion opportunities in 1760 call centers in sixteen countries. We find substantial differences in promotion opportunities internal to the unit versus elsewhere, related to the use of explicit versus tacit knowledge in performance evaluation, distinctions between unit‐specific and general‐firm knowledge, and network‐bridging organizational characteristics.     

When Do U.S. Workers First Experience Unionization? Implications for Revitalizing the Labor Movement

Debates over revitalizing the U.S. labor movement often overlook when workers are first unionized. This article analyzes the frequency and nature of workers’ first unionized jobs by tracking a cohort of individuals from age 15/16 to 40/41. Though workers are most likely to be unionized when they are in their forties, this article shows that surprising numbers of individuals first encounter unionization in their jobs at a much younger age. These results highlight the importance of experiential union membership models as well as life‐cycle union representation strategies that recognize the young age at which many workers are first unionized.     

CEO compensation in EU telecom companies: Does the state design the right incentives?

This paper analyzes the structure of CEO pay in European fixed telecommunication companies, focusing on the impact of state ownership. Results show that, under the (partial or total) control of the state, the level of CEO compensation is lower and pay-performance sensitivity is higher than in privately-controlled firms. This finding suggests the state provides an incentive as well as a monitoring effect. However, when the state holds the majority of the shares, the pay level is significantly affected by the CEO power, suggesting that in these firms, CEOs are more likely to be entrenched with boards and succeed in raising their pay.