Alternative theories of wage dispersion

We analyze labor market models where the law of one price fails—i.e., models with equilibrium wage dispersion. We begin considering ex ante heterogeneous workers, but highlight a problem with this approach: If search is costly the market shuts down. We then assume homogeneous workers but ex post heterogeneous matches. This model is robust to search costs, and delivers equilibrium wage dispersion. However, we prove that the law of two prices holds: Equilibrium implies at most two wages. We explore other models, including one combining ex ante and ex post heterogeneity which is robust and delivers more realistic wage dispersion.     

Training, search and wage dispersion

This paper combines on-the-job search and human capital theory to study the coexistence of firm-funded general training and frequent job turnovers. Although ex ante identical, firms differ in their training decisions. The model generates correlations between various firm characteristics that are consistent with the data. Wage dispersion exists among ex ante identical workers because workers of the same productivity are paid differently across firms, and because workers differ in their productivity ex post. Endogenous training breaks the perfect correlation between work experience and human capital, which yields new insights on wage dispersion and wage dynamics.     

Minimum wage,on-the-job search and employment: On the sectoral and aggregate equilibrium effect of the mandatory minimum wage

We study the impact of a minimum wage in a segmented labor market in which workers are at different stages of their careers. At the end of a learning-by-doing period, workers paid the minimum wage quit “bad jobs” for better-paying “good jobs”, following an on-the-job search process with endogenous search intensity. A rise in the minimum wage reduces “bad jobs” creation and prompts workers to keep their “bad jobs” by reducing on-the-job search intensity. The ambiguous impact on unqualified employment replicates and explains the findings of several empirical studies. However, a minimum wage rise reduces overall employment and output.     

The role of unemployment in wage determination: further evidence on the wage curve from Turkey

This paper presents an empirical estimation of the correlation between wages and regional unemployment rates in Turkey, more specifically it explores the role of regional unemployment rates in wage determination. The analysis builds upon a series of recent empirical studies on the wage-unemployment relationship, now commonly known as ‘the wage curve’, a downward sloping curve in wage-unemployment space. The existing studies are for most part in advanced market economies, while this paper presents one of the few attempts at a wage curve analysis within the context of a developing market economy. A cross-sectional estimation of micro level individual wage data for the Turkish labour market in 1994, suggest a statistically significant negative correlation between wages and regional unemployment rates. Separate regressions for men and women, however, show a wage curve to exist only in the male labour market. The study also presents the results on other variables of wage determination such as returns to schooling, returns to age, job tenure, gender, industrial and occupational affiliation of the worker, economic sector and union status.     

The impact of education expansion on wage inequality

The findings on education expansion and income inequality have important implications for policymakers to implement effective policies to reduce income inequality. This study attempts to explain how education expansion affects income inequality by education distribution and the rate of return to education. We decompose the effect of education expansion on wage gaps into price effect and structure effect. We compare the income inequality from 2002 to 2013 using the Chinese Household Income Project (CHIP) 2002 and CHIP2013 survey data and employ FFL decomposition method. Our findings suggest that income inequality increased in 2013 and that income inequality among the high-income groups increased even more significantly. The structure effect of education expansion on income inequality is negative, when average education increases one year, the income gap between 80th and 20th will decrease 1.2%, in other words, education expansion decreases income inequality by allowing a wide range of individuals to attend college. However, this effect is offset by the price effect, which is positive and much more significant in magnitude. One extra year of average education will increase income gap by 29% which means that the demand for high-skilled labour is increasing faster than the supply and thus lead to the increasing premium for higher education return.     

Increasing wage dispersion and the changes in relative employment and wages in Mexico's urban informal sector: 1987-1993

This study analyses the role of changes in informal/formal relative employment, wage levels and wage inequality in explaining increasing wage dispersion in Mexico during the 1987–1993 period. From 1987 to 1993, the variance of the log of hourly wages for Mexican workers increased by more than 50 per cent. Using data from the Encuesta nacional de empleo urbano we find that this increase in the overall wage dispersion was mainly driven by increasing wage dispersion in the formal sector coupled with a faster growth in formal sector employment as a percentage of total employment. However, compression in the distribution of wages within the informal sector contributed to substantially slowdown the increasing overall wage inequality. About 60 per cent of the 1987–1993 4.65 percentage point reduction in the informal sector share of total employment is explained by changes in the structure that determines sectoral employment; the rest is explained by changes in the composition of the labour force, particularly increases in the sectoral education gap and a change in the regional relative share of sectoral employment. Also, from 1987 to 1993 the sectoral wage ratio increased from 0.59 to 0.63. It seems that a relative improvement in unobserved skills in the informal sector helped to close the wage differential but this effect was partially offset by an increase in the relative prices of both observed and unobserved skills, as well as increases in relative observed skills in the formal sector, particularly education.     

The determination of union and non-union wage rates

If, in a partially unionised economy, union workers force up their absolute wage rate, how does this affect the wage paid in the non-union sector? This paper suggests a simple answer. First, in a small open economy a rise in the union wage will raise the non-union wage. Secondly, in a closed economy — or one with some monopoly power in world trade — a rise in the union wage seems likely to depress the non-union wage.     

The wage curve before and during the Greek economic crisis

Using cross-sectional data from the Labour Force Survey, we investigate whether a wage curve, i.e. a negative relationship between real wages and regional unemployment, could be estimated in the Greek labour market and in the period 1999–2014. Adopting individual static and regional dynamic specifications, our results do not support the existence of such a relationship despite the extensive macroeconomic adjustment of real wages after 2009. However, allowing for period-specific heterogeneous slopes, we find that a negative relationship between wages and regional unemployment emerged in the period 2010Q2–2011Q4 which however was short-lived. This relationship appears to be exclusively due to the restructuring of the collective bargaining regime and the reduction in the national minimum wages, both of which were implemented in the private sector.     

The evolution of wage inequality in Italy

This article analyses the evolution of inequality in yearly and daily wages between and within groups of blue and white collar, using the INPS-ISFOL database for the period 1985 to 1999 in Italy. Between-group inequality increased in the 1990s as clerical wages grew slowly, whereas blue collars' wages remained nearly constant. Within-group inequality increased only if measured by daily wages. The covariance structure analysis shows that inequality comes from persistent differentials among older workers and from high income volatility for younger cohorts. Within inequalities in office and manual workers are driven by the growth of permanency for the older cohorts (individual abilities, say experience, matter more) and by the growth of income volatility for the younger cohorts (luck in the labour market). Within each group, low paid workers during their career acquire earning gains for their abilities and reduce differentials with respect to high paid workers.     

The wage effects of ethnicity in Estonia

Using the retrospective (1989-94) Estonian Labour Force Survey (ELFS), we attempt to examine potential wage discrimination based on ethnicity (Estonian and Russian). Using standard wage decomposition methodology, we look at male full-time workers in the years 1989 and 1994. There is no evidence of discrimination against either ethnic group in 1989. However, the available data provide substantial evidence of discrimination against ethnic Russians in 1994. The evidence also suggests that Estonian language ability does not significantly affect wages. Surprisingly, Estonian-born ethnic Russians appear to fare worse than immigrant ethnic Russians in terms of wages.
JEL classification: J71, P23.     

The composition of wage differentials between migrants and natives

We consider the role of unobservables, such as differences in search frictions, reservation wages, and productivities for the explanation of wage differentials between migrants and natives. We disentangle these by estimating an empirical general equilibrium search model with on-the-job search due to Bontemps et al. (1999) on segments of the labour market defined by occupation, age, and nationality using a large scale German administrative dataset.The native-migrant wage differential is then decomposed into several parts, and we focus especially on the component that we label “migrant effect”, being the difference in wage offers between natives and migrants in the same occupation-age segment in firms of the same productivity. Counterfactual decompositions of wage differentials allow us to identify and quantify their drivers, thus explaining within a common framework what is often labelled the unexplained wage gap.     

Personality and the gender wage gap

In this study, we investigate whether personality traits contribute towards a better understanding of the reasons for the gender wage gap. We explore whether two of the personality factors put forward by Bowles et al. (2001) as likely to be incentive enhancing in the employer–employee relationship can explain the difference in wages for women and men. These are (1) personal self efficacy (Locus of Control (LoC)) and (2) time preference. We also study the role of the so called Big Five personality traits (extraversion, emotional stability, agreeableness, openness intellect and conscientiousness), which have been associated with earnings in several recent studies. Using a sample of Dutch employees, we found that 11.5% of the observed gender wage gap could be ascribed to differences in the personality trait scores (mainly in agreeableness and intellect), while less than 0.5% could be ascribed to gender differences in the returns to the traits. The addition of personality traits to a traditional human capital model reduces the unexplained part of the gender wage gap from 75.2% to 62.7%. We therefore conclude that these traits represent a valuable addition to the model.     

The wage effects of subsidized career breaks

This article studies how subsidized career breaks affect future labor market performance. The analysis uses a Swedish career break program where applications were accepted until local funds were exhausted. The rejected applicants serve as counterfactuals to derive estimates that are unaffected by selection or omitted variables. The estimated wage effect of a 10-month-long break is negative and in the order of 3 % 1–2 years after the interruption. The average applicant is estimated to have substantially lower returns to experience than the average worker. The results thus show that career breaks are costly, even for groups with low expected returns to experience, and in an environment with very compressed wages. The career breaks also induced an increase in job and task mobility whereas post-leave labor supply remained unaffected except for workers close to retirement.     

The welfare costs of union wage compression

This paper calculates the quantitative significance of the welfare costs of union wage compression. This is done in a dynamic general equilibrium model with overlapping generations where agents choose both schooling (human capital) and assets (physical capital). The labor market in this model is characterized as a right-to-manage contract, which allows unions to compress wage differentials between high- and low-skilled workers, by implementing a binding minimum wage. This paper shows that when labor markets are competitive even low levels of wage compression lead to large welfare losses, since wage compression creates costly unemployment among low-skilled workers. The effect of wage compression on the supply of skilled labor, however, is rather small, since the disincentive effect of a lower, high-skilled wage is, to a large extent, offset by a lower opportunity cost of schooling due to higher unemployment.     

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