Accumulation and distribution of human capital: the interaction between individual and aggregate variables

The paper analyses the joint evolution of accumulation and distribution of human capital in an OLG framework. Dynamics arises from the interplay between human capital distribution and individual variables—inherited human capital and inborn ability. Such interaction drives individual investment in human capital and accumulation in the economy. According to initial distribution the model provides different dynamical behaviours linking growth and inequality; in general economies with a more equal initial distribution grow faster but other cases are possible. Moreover, since the model provides an endogenous threshold for investing in human capital, the distribution is characterised by multi-modality.     

中国地区间对外贸易的差异性:1978～2007年

本文利用1978～2007年期间的统计数据,基于区域经济学和空间经济学的视角,借鉴并融合不同学科的经典研究方法对中国30个省市间、3大区域间的对外贸易差异性进行实证研究.研究结果表明:中国30省市间对外贸易的绝对差异越来越大,但自从1992年以来,相对差异整体表现为下降的趋势;自从1992年以来,东部地区的内部差异日益加剧,两极化趋势日益明显;地区间对外贸易差异主要表现为外部差异;对外贸易对中国经济的整体促进作用存在"边际效应递减"的趋势,外贸发展领先地区都是东部沿海省市,广东、北京和上海3个省市的增长极效应日益明显,上海代替广东成为中国贸易发展最为领先的地区;中国省市间对外贸易的差异程度日益严重.因此,为了缩小地区间对外贸易的差异性,中央政府有必要在中西部省市培育新的经济圈和增长极,加快东部产业向中西部省市的转移,并加大对中西部省市的投资力度.     

The Gendered Nature of Poverty in the EU: Individualized versus Collective Poverty Measures

Due to the adoption of the household as a unit of analysis, researchers have failed to identify accurate measures of women's income poverty. This study proposes an individualized measure of European poverty to highlight gender differences in the economic crisis. Employing data from the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) for the period 2007–12, it compares the household-based at-risk-of-poverty rate (ARPR) and the individualized financial dependency rate (FDR). The study shows that the gender gap in poverty in Europe is considerably higher when computed through FDR. Indeed, since the ARPR constitutes a proxy of the household's average conditions, it levels down gender inequalities within the household and also variations in individuals’ incomes over time. Only more detailed data collection on intrahousehold resource sharing will possibly allow the development of more precise and realistic indicators of women's and men's risks of poverty and financial dependency.     

Income, income inequality, and health: Evidence from China

This paper tests using survey data from China whether individual health is associated with income and community-level income inequality. Although poor health and high inequality are key features of many developing countries, most of the earlier literature has drawn on data from developed countries in studying the association between the two. We find that self-reported health status increases with per capita income, but at a decreasing rate. Controlling for per capita income, we find an inverted-U association between self-reported health status and income inequality, which suggests that high inequality in a community poses threats to health. We also find that high inequality increases the probability of health-compromising behavior such as smoking and alcohol consumption. Most of our findings are robust to different measures of health status and income inequality. Journal of Comparative Economics 34 (4) (2006) 668–693.     

Gender difference in the impact of retirement on cognitive abilities: Evidence from urban China

This paper examines the impact of retirement on cognitive functioning by gender in urban China and investigates the underlying mechanisms. Based on data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study, the paper uses the mandatory retirement ages and different policy enforcement between the public and private sectors as instruments for retirement status. The analysis finds substantial gender heterogeneity in the effect of retirement on cognition, with a positive and significant effect for males, but a negative and less significant effect for females. The beneficial effects on cognition are stronger for male blue-collar workers, who are likely to pursue a more active lifestyle at retirement. Further investigation shows that the results are partly driven by differential behavioral changes at retirement, and the gender difference in retirement ages may also play a potential role.     

Competitive experience and gender difference in risk preference,trust preference and academic performance: Evidence from Gaokao in China

This study examines whether and how competitive experience affects gender difference in the preferences for risk and trust as well as academic performance. By utilizing the provincial differences in college admission rates as an indicator of competitive experience for students, we assess its relationship with gender difference in risk preference, trust preference, and academic performance. We find that females from provinces with lower college admission rates are more risk averse and less trustful, and perform better in more competitive environment, compared with their male counterparts. Our study suggests that observed gender differences may partially reflect the effects of schooling environment rather than inherent gender traits.     

Risk Preferences and Gender Differences in Union Membership in Late Nineteenth-Century Swedish Manufacturing

Women are generally seen as less inclined to join trade unions. This study matches firm–worker data from the Swedish cigar and printing industries around 1900 and examines information on men and women holding the same jobs; such data are rare but important for understanding gender gaps. The results explain the gender gap in union membership among compositors, but not among cigar workers. Differences in union membership varied considerably across firms, with the largest differences found in low-union-density cigar firms where indirect costs (that is, uncertainty and risk) accrued in particular to women workers. The lack of gender differences in mutual aid membership indicates that women were not hard to organize but avoided organizations associated with greater risk for employer retaliation and uncertain returns according to a cost–benefit analysis.     

Wealth inequality and collective action

We study the effect of inequality in the distribution of endowments of private inputs (e.g., land, wealth) that are complementary in production with collective inputs (e.g., contribution to public goods such as irrigation and extraction from common-property resources) on efficiency in a class of collective action problems. We focus on characterizing the joint surplus maximizing level of inequality, making due distinction between contributors and non-contributors, in a framework that allows us to consider a wide variety of collective action problems ranging from pure public goods to impure public goods to commons. We show that while efficiency increases with greater equality within the groups of contributors and non-contributors, so long the externalities (positive or negative) are significant, there is an optimal degree of inequality between these groups.     

Did immigration contribute to wage stagnation of unskilled workers?

In this paper we first show that the timing and skill distribution of Immigrants to the U.S. between 1970 and 2014 imply they did not contribute to the decline in the wages of native, non-college educated workers – including high school dropouts – at the national level. We then review other evidence at the local level, which implies immigration is not associated with lower non-college wages. Rather, higher immigration seems associated with higher average (and college-level) wages. Local externalities, complementarities, efficient specialization and appropriate technological choice suggest at least part of the positive association is causal.     

Shocking news and cognitive performance

We study how shocking news affects cognitive performance. Identifying these effects makes societies more resilient by helping to adjust policy responses to reduce indirect costs of future atrocities. Our analysis is based on a school shooting that coincided with national matriculation exams, allowing a difference-in-differences analysis. We find a substantial negative effect on males: their average performance dropped by seven percent. The average performance of females was unaffected. Our findings suggest that a shocking event may call for psychological support for young people even in communities that are not directly affected.