Earnings and Percentage Female: A Longitudinal Study

Comparable worth advocates assume that the relation between earnings and percentage female in an occupation is due to crowding or other forms of discrimination. An alternative explanation is that the relation stems from women freely choosing different occupations. Using longitudinal data to control for time-invariant omitted variables, as well as cross-sectional data (for comparison with previous research), we find that although men's estimated penalty is not reduced, the percentage female penalty falls substantially for women and is not statistically significant. These results imply that estimates of the percentage female effect based on cross-sectional data may be inflated for women–except for those with intermittent labor force participation. This group does experience a sizeable penalty for working in female-dominated occupations. Hence, a comparable worth policy would most likely benefit women with discontinuous employment.     

Trade Openness and Labor Force Participation in Africa: The Role of Political Institutions*

Trade liberalization is usually expected to lead to greater economic activity including higher labor force participation rates. Using data from forty‐eight Sub‐Saharan African countries over the period 1985–2012, we explore the impact of trade openness on labor force participation rates (LFPR), and examine how political institutions such as democracy, political rights, and civil liberties can play a role in driving this relationship in the above group of low‐income countries. The estimated marginal impact of openness on LFPR shows that LFPR is increasing with the level of institutional quality. In particular, political institutions are critical in enhancing the benefit from openness. Our conclusions are similar for male and female participation rates although the magnitudes of the former are higher, thus confirming that improving institutions can generate greater labor market benefits from trade in poor countries.     

The Suburbanization of Industry and Its Effects Upon Labor Force Participation Rates of Suburban Women

Post-World War II intrametropolitan dispersion of industry has been well documented in the literature on contemporary suburbanization. There has, however, been no empirical research conducted to determine the effect of the restructured metropolitan economy upon labor force participation rates of suburban residents, especially of suburban married women. The purpose of this study is to fill this research gap. The hypothesis tested is that increased employment opportunities in the suburbs will increase labor force participation of suburban married women, ceteris paribus . The research results show the hypothesized relationship to be correct. The variable developed in this study and used as a proxy for the degree of intrametropolitan industrial dispersion is statistically significant, albeit a bit weak, in explaining intersuburban variation in labor force participation rates of married women, husband present. Other variables (such as median school years completed) included in more traditional non-spatially oriented labor force behavior models are statistically insignificant in explaining areal variation in participation rates. The findings point up the necessity of recognizing the spatial complexities of the urban economy.     

劳动报酬占比变动的产业结构调整效应分析

劳动者报酬GDP占比下滑是中国劳动收入增长背景下的客观事实。在农村剩余劳动供给相对充裕条件下,劳动报酬占比变化反映了产业结构变迁中的劳动边际产出效率变化。二元经济下的工业化及三次产业结构调整和升级过程中,资本替代劳动是劳动报酬产业内效应变化的主要原因,边际生产率决定的劳动工资引导劳动要素从劳动报酬较高的农业部门向非农业部门转移是劳动报酬占比产业间效应下降的原因。随人口自然增长率下降,劳动力绝对供给能力面临下降,农村剩余劳动力相对供给能力减弱,劳动供给曲线左移将替代劳动边际生产率对劳动报酬的决定,直接提升产业间劳动力转移成本并带动产业内劳动力报酬提升。     

Labor market participation of Chinese agricultural households: Empirical evidence from Zhejiang province

This work is devoted to the analysis of the different labor market participation regimes of Chinese farm households over the reform process in the 1980s and 1990s. Using household data over the period 1986–2002 from the province Zhejiang, we apply a multinomial logit model to empirically examine household, farm, and regional characteristics affecting the probability that farmers participate in one of four alternative labor market regimes. As generally accepted, off-farm participation is the dominant form of farm households’ labor market participation. But rural households show additionally a significant impact on rural employment mainly linked with non-agricultural household business. Results suggest that labor market decisions are significantly related to several family, farm, and village characteristics. In particular, we find education to be a key determinant of participation. Furthermore, results point to a higher probability of female household members to take up off-farm work.     

Female participation in African labor markets: The role of information and communication technologies

This article investigates the effects of information and communication technologies (ICT) on female labor force participation in a sample of 48 African countries. We specify and estimate linear regression and dynamic panel data models with fixed effects (FE) and system-generalized method of moments (SYS-GMM) estimation over the period 2001–2017. The three main results are that ICT use (mobile phone and internet) significantly stimulates female labor force participation in Africa; this effect is enhanced by financial development and female education; the effect of ICT on female employment in Africa is strongest in the industrial sector. These results remain robust to the provision of social, cultural, and institutional variables.     

Gender Role Attitudes,Labor Supply,and Human Capital Formation

This study examines the relationship between attitudes toward women's roles in the labor force and human capital acquisition. I analyze both educational attainment and post schooling training spells. Holding more traditional attitudes about gender roles is associated with both lower educational attainment and lower probability of participating in post schooling training episodes. Also, gender role attitudes appear to have significant indirect effects on human capital acquisition, operating through a lower probability of labor market participation.     

The Plateau in U.S. Women's Labor Force Participation: A Cohort Analysis

After going up steadily for the last century, the female labor force participation (FLFP) rate in the United States suddenly leveled off in the early 1990s. Using March Current Population Survey data, I find that the FLFP stopped rising for birth cohorts from the 1950s on. My shift‐share analyses show that both the plateau and the earlier upward trend in FLFP appeared within almost every category broken down by education, marital status, and child‐rearing.     

Occupational and Internal Labor Markets in Japan

The distinction between internal and occupational labor markets requires the development of informative indicators that go beyond standard measures such as firm size, which are too vague. This article develops an alternative measure, based on the comparison between firm-specific and occupation-specific tenure, and applies it to Japanese occupational data. We believe that the proposed measure is useful not only in classifying different occupations according to the degree of labor market internalization but also in documenting changes over time in job definition, "reengineering" of the corporation, and the like.     

产业转移特征及其与企业亏损、劳动力转移关系研究

本文采用比较分析方法,基于纺织业,纺织服装、鞋帽制造业和化学纤维制造业2001～2010年统计数据,分析产业转移特征与趋势,并进一步探讨与企业亏损及劳动力转移的关系。研究结论表明:(1)从2001～2010年10年来看,纺织业和纺织服装、鞋帽制造业由东部向中西部转移,而化学纤维制造业由中部向东西部转移;(2)从2001～2010年10年内不同时间阶段来看,纺织业等三大产业在2001～2004年间都由中西部向东部转移,2004年后纺织业和纺织服装、鞋帽制造业转为由东部向中西部转移,而化学纤维制造业2004年后由中部向东西部转移;(3)纺织业等三大产业转移特征与产业内企业亏损数量及劳动力转移是紧密相联系的。这些对于我们正确认识产业转移是我国工业化过程中的客观现象,以及只有加快产业有序转移,才有利于促进区域经济协调可持续发展,具有重要的现实意义。     

State Tax Policy, Labor, and Tax Revenue Feedback Effects

A new computable general equilibrium model is used to predict the effects of tax rate changes on employment and other macrovariables in California. The model is dynamic in accounting for both migration and investment. The relative strength of migration, labor force participation, and investment in causing tax-rate-decrease-induced growth is examined. The model is used to contrast expected effects of a tax rate increase with and without migration and investment.     

Sex and Interoccupational Wage Differences in Israel

An examination of the influence of the sex identification of an occupation on earnings reveals that: (1) male occupations earn more than female occupations; (2) nonsegregated occupations tend to be more similar in earnings to female than to male occupations; (3) the majority of female occupations earn below the mean for occupations at each level of education; the inverse is true for male occupations; (4) men in female occupations earn less than they do in male occupations; and (5) women in male occupations do not consistently earn more than women in female occupations at comparable levels of education. Our data indicate that they tend to gravitate toward the lower earning male occupations. These findings support the hypothesis that in Israel, as elsewhere, occupational segregation is an important factor underlying earning differentials between women and men. Wage differentials are the result not only of differences in human capital resources, but also of unequal opportunities within the occupational structure. The division of labor by sex does not cause inequality—rather it permits the perpetuation of a system of social relations in which the work women do is allocated inferior status and economic rewards. The social forces which produce and sustain this reality are worthy of further investigation.     

工业化、高速经济增长与协调分工的制度安排

在工业化过程中，后起国家可以利用模仿与“学习效应”（包括技术模仿、生产组织方式模仿、管理模仿等）获得“加速的成本下降”，而“加速的成本下降”可以使后起国家的工业化进程明显快于先行国家．因而在潜质上具有更高的经济增长速度。但在工业化初期，工业体系的形成需要大量的企业互补投资，由于产业发展的不确定性极强，资本市场和市场价格难以负载未来信息．市场很难在较短的时间内协调工业化早期所必须的分工．从而产生“协调失灵”现象。东亚国家都利用了各种不同程度和方式的政府干预成功地解决分工“协调失灵”问题．因而产生了具有与发达国家不同的市场体制．但这种体制也潜藏了较大的弊病．在日后的发展过程中逐步表现出来。     

Task Polarization in the Japanese Labor Market: Evidence of a Long‐Term Trend

By quantifying the various skills required for different occupations, we examine the long‐term trend in labor‐market polarization in Japan in terms of tasks from 1960 to 2005. We find that the input share of nonroutine tasks has consistently and gradually increased, while that of routine tasks has decreased. With regard to nonroutine tasks, we observe an increase in the input shares of both high‐skilled analytical and interactive tasks and low‐skilled manual tasks. While we also find that the polarization depends on the introduction of technology, the progress of polarization is slower and smaller in Japan than in other countries.     

Half a Career: Discrimination & Railroad Internal Labor Markets

This paper examines the causes and consequences of the racial structure of railroad internal labor markets in the American South. By 1900, many southern railroads hired blacks almost exclusively for middle-level occupations on their trains but did not permit their promotion to top-level positions. This institutionalized bias in promotion helps explain the employment of whites and blacks at identical jobs but different wages. It also explains why it was impossible for some southern railroads to adopt the seniority-based promotion ladders that had become standard on railroads elsewhere in the United States.     

Highly Educated Immigrants and Native Occupational Choice

Economic debate about the consequences of immigration in the United States has largely focused on how influxes of foreign‐born labor with little educational attainment have affected similarly educated native‐born workers. Fewer studies analyze the effect of immigration within the market for highly educated labor. We use O*NET data on job characteristics to assess whether native‐born workers with graduate degrees respond to an increased presence of highly educated foreign‐born workers by choosing new occupations with different skill content. We find that highly educated native and foreign‐born workers are imperfect substitutes. Immigrants with graduate degrees specialize in occupations demanding quantitative and analytical skills, whereas their native‐born counterparts specialize in occupations requiring interactive and communication skills. When the foreign‐born proportion of highly educated employment within an occupation rises, native employees with graduate degrees choose new occupations with less analytical and more communicative content.     

Labor‐Market Specialization within Same‐Sex and Difference‐Sex Couples

We use data from the 2000 decennial U.S. Census to compare differences in earnings, hours worked, and labor‐force participation between members of different household types, including same‐sex couples, different‐sex couples, and roommates. Both same‐sex and different‐sex couples exhibit some degree of household specialization, whereas roommates show little or no degree of specialization. Of all household types, married couples exhibit by far the highest degree of specialization with respect to labor‐market outcomes. With respect to differences in earnings and hours, gay male couples are more similar to married couples than lesbian or unmarried heterosexual couples are to married couples.     

劳动力流动与产业组织变化的互动关系研究——以中国汽车产业为例

国内外理论界对劳动力流动和产业组织变化的研究，长期以来主要是沿单一线路推进——要么主要研究劳动力流动问题、要么主要研究产业组织变化问题。而很少有学者对两者之间的互动关系进行深入研究。本文以中国汽车产业为分析对象．运用实证方法对劳动力流动与产业组织变化的互动关系进行了研究．分析了两者之间的互相影响效应．提炼、归纳出了一些具有规律性的新结论。论文最后从新的角度分析了中国汽车产业组织结构欠优化、劳动力配置不合理的成因．并提出了解决问题的对策建议。     

The Nature and the Determinants of Labor Market Transitions in Former Socialist Economies: Evidence from Bulgaria

To generate stylized facts on transitions between different labor market states during early transition, panel data for a sample of the registered unemployed in Bulgaria were collected. We find that about 60 percent of the unemployed are long-term unemployed. From logit regressions we find that women who had higher education and had not received unemployment benefits are more likely to be reemployed. For men, these factors are not significant, although participation in a training program is significant.     

Declining Union Strength and Labor Cost Inflation in the 1980s

This paper explores the hypothesis that the declining strength of labor unions underlies the moderation of labor cost inflation in the 1980s, which is not explained by standard Phillips curve equations. Data on union density, union certification and decertification election results, and work stoppages are used as proxies for union strength. No support is found for the declining union strength hypothesis at either the aggregate level (using economywide or union-sector labor cost series) or the industry level.