The impact of public employment on labour market performance: evidence from African countries

Using census data for Ghana, Mali and Mozambique, we study the long-term impact of public sector employment on local labour markets. We find that the public sector crowds out private employment and induces skilled workers to queue for a public job, thus increasing their unemployment rate. In addition, a growing public sector fosters employment in the tradable and nontradable sectors, remarkably for the unskilled, and the reallocation of unskilled workers away from agriculture.     

Matching and Inverse Propensity Weighting Estimates of the Union Wage Premium: Evidence from Canada, 1997–2014

I estimate the union wage premium for private‐sector workers using Canadian data from Statistics Canada's Labour Force Survey from 1997 to 2014, examining the trend and gender differences in the premium. I obtain my estimates using matching and inverse propensity weighting estimators, which form counterfactuals for union workers. These estimators create better covariate balance and can also be used to address the bias that arises from the log transformation of wages.     

Exploring complementarity in on‐ and off‐job training for apprenticeships

The differences between on‐ and off‐job learning environments continue to be the subject of much debate, and the notion of complementarity between them is a perennial issue for most forms of training and development. This paper grapples with this issue in relation to apprentices in the building industry in Australia. It analyses the different perceptions of complementarity held by apprentices, host employers and college teachers. It strives to understand the diverse meanings of complementarity within the context of communities of practice in which apprentices acquire not only vocational knowledge and skills, but also a sense of identity through internalising sometimes complementary but often contradictory messages from their different learning environments. Their development towards the status of ‘competent tradespersons’ heavily depends on their individual abilities to integrate and synthesise these messages.     

Consumers' Preferences for GM Food and Voluntary Information Access: A Simultaneous Choice Analysis

Previous studies on information and consumer choices have typically assumed that information is exogenous in that information made available to consumers is generally treated as being both received and processed. Based on a choice experiment on consumers' stated preferences for genetically modified food that provides for voluntary information access, this study allows information access decisions to be endogenous to the product choice decision‐making process. Instead of assuming correlated error terms between these decisions, the approach used in this analysis builds upon structural correlations between two models that individually consider each of these two decisions. We find that the two types of decisions are related and that there is heterogeneity across individuals in the nature of this relationship. Des études antérieures sur l'information et les choix des consommateurs ont typiquement supposé que l'information est exogène, en ce sens que l'information mise à la disposition des consommateurs est généralement considérée comme étant à la fois reçue et traitée. Selon une méthode de choix expérimentaux sur les préférences déclarées des consommateurs quant aux aliments génétiquement modifiés offrant l'accès volontaire à l'information, la présente étude permet aux décisions d'accès à l'information d'être endogènes au processus de décision lié au choix du produit. Au lieu de supposer des termes d'erreur corrélés entre ces décisions, la méthode utilisée dans la présente analyse mise sur la corrélation structurale entre les deux modèles qui examinent individuellement ces deux décisions. Nous trouvons que les deux types de décisions sont liés et qu'il existe une hétérogénéité entre les individus quant à la nature de ce lien.     

Manipulating market sentiment

We analyze a simple model of an asset market, in which a large rational trader interacts with “noise speculators” who seek short-run speculative gains, and become active following a prolonged episode of mispricing relative to the asset’s fundamental value. The model gives rise to price patterns such as bubble dynamics, positive short-run correlation and vanishing long-run correlation of price deviations from the fundamental value. We argue that this example model sheds light on the question as to whether rational speculators abet or curb price fluctuations.     

EUROPEAN ECONOMIC INTEGRATION AND COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGES

On the basis of a set of Input-Output tables we computed the European Net Product Possibility Frontier (NPPF) for the years from 1995 to 2011. During this period, several barriers to trade have been removed, allowing higher levels of trade and regional integration. Subsequently, we propose a method to check whether the prediction to be derived from Comparative Advantages (CAs) theory, namely, a specialization pattern that allows to reach the NPPF, is verified. The results suggest that CAs were not exploited well during the period considered and no positive trend emerged. The implication of our results is that there is ample scope for a coordinated policy aimed at improving allocation of resources. Further research on this topic seems to be necessary.     

Closing the development finance gap in post-conflict and fragile situations: What role for development finance institutions?

For many years, the main focus of international institutions and bilateral aid agencies has been on state building as the main action to support countries' recovery from conflicts or other fragile situations. The role of the private sector has been widely overlooked, despite being crucial in supporting economic growth and job creation. We argue that development finance institutions have a dedicated role to play in closing financial gaps, which are widening as fragility increases. They have the comparative advantages needed to make projects happen by supporting the private sector, hence significantly contributing to the recovery process.