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Women’s Evolving Careers Helped Shrink the Gender Pay Gap
The narrowing of the gender pay gap since the 1970s appears to be linked to women increasing their labor force attachment and shifting to higher-paying occupations.
Journal Article
Home Production Activity during the COVID-19 Shutdown
An increase in household activities—including child care and cooking—between January and April coincides with job losses during the coronavirus pandemic.
Working Paper
Gender Gap
We employ the Ben-Porath (1967) human capital model to study the evolution of the gender wage gap over the long run. We consider the effect of changing lifecycle profiles of female market hours. We find that the implied response in unobserved investment in human capital accumulation accounts for most of the long run gender wage gap dynamics. This finding is consistent with the labor economists’ view that changing selection on unobservables played a critical role in the gender wage gap dynamics. Our contribution is to make explicit and quantify the link between market hours and (unobserved) ...
Working Paper
Causes and Consequences of Student-College Mismatch
College admissions are highly meritocratic in the U.S. today. It is not the case in many other countries. What is the tradeoff? On one hand, meritocracy produces more human capital overall if higher ability students learn more in college and if they learn more in higher quality colleges. This leads to a higher overall level of earnings (i.e. greater efficiency, loosely speaking). On the other hand, more meritocracy generates a higher degree of earnings inequality. In this paper, we quantify this efficiency-equality tradeoff. Our results suggest small efficiency losses/gains from student ...
Working Paper
Imperfect Information Transmission from Banks to Investors: Macroeconomic Implications
Our goal is to elucidate the interaction of banks' screening effort and strategic information production in loan-backed asset markets using a general equilibrium framework. Asset quality is unobserved by investors, but banks may purchase error-prone ratings. The premium paid on highly rated assets emerges as the main determinant of banks' screening effort. The fact that rating strategies reflect banks' private information about asset quality helps keep this premium high. Conventional regulatory policies interfere with this decision margin, thereby reducing signaling value of high ratings and ...
Working Paper
The Evolution of Lifetime Hours and the Gender Wage Gap
The gender wage gap decreased (opened) from 1940 to 1975 and then increased (closed) until 2010. We use the model introduced in Ben-Porath (1967) to assess the role of gender differences in life cycle profiles of market time in explaining this dynamics. Men's profiles changed little across cohorts, but women's profiles converged to that of men implying, eventually, stronger incentives for women to accumulate human capital. We calibrate the model and find that (1) The 1940-75 decrease of the gap was because men valued human capital more than women due to their working more. The 1975-10 ...
COVID-19 and the Great Recession: Market Hours and Home Production across American Households
Women and households with children have been hit harder in this recession than they were in the previous recession.
How Nonmonetary Job Amenities Improve with Higher Education
Nonmonetary job amenities tend to improve in occupations that require higher levels of education, providing an additional reason for college enrollment.
Analyzing How Students Pick Which College to Attend
Research Officer Oksana Leukhina discusses her economic research on the college selection process.
Why Do Women Outnumber Men in College Enrollment?
Women appear to have a relatively higher financial return to college education than men, who have access to lucrative careers that require only a high school diploma.