Search Results
Working Paper
Measuring temporary labor outsourcing in U.S. manufacturing
Several analysts claim that firms have been using more flexible work arrangements in order to contain the costly adjustment of labor to changes in economic conditions. In particular, temporary help supply (THS) employment has increased dramatically in the last ten years. However, there is only scant evidence on the industries that are hiring this type of worker. In particular, some anecdotal evidence points to the fact that manufacturing industries have substantially stepped up their demand for THS workers since the mid-1980s. If this is true, not accounting for this flow of workers from the ...
Journal Article
Temporary help services and the volatility of industry output
To gain a better understanding of how fluctuations in output influence firms' decision to hire temporary workers, the authors examine the relationship between output volatility and the use of temporary labor. They find that, all things being equal, temporary employment is higher in states with more volatile industries and lower in states with a relatively high degree of co-movement of industry output fluctuations.
Journal Article
Who are temporary nurses?
Using data from the National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses, the authors compare the characteristics of temporary and permanent registered nurses. They compare their findings for the nursing profession with characteristics of temporary and permanent workers in other occupations. They also look at the role of geography in a registered nurse?s decision to become a temporary worker.
Working Paper
Manufacturing plants’ use of temporary workers: an analysis using census micro data
Using plant-level data from the Plant Capacity Utilization (PCU) Survey, we examine how a manufacturing plant?s use of temporary workers is associated with the nature of its output fluctuations. Our empirical evidence suggests that plants choose temps over perms when they expect output to fall, which allows them to avoid costs associated with laying off permanent employees. We also found that plants whose output levels are associated with greater levels of uncertainty use more temps. The effects of other variables are also tested in order to examine the validity of various views about why ...
Working Paper
Demand volatility and the lag between the growth of temporary and permanent employment
The growth rate of temporary help service employment is often considered to be a leading business cycle indicator, because the firing and hiring of temporary help workers typically lead that of permanent workers. However, few works in the literature focus on the mechanism that generates the lag between temporary and permanent growth. This paper investigates how demand volatility is related to the lag. Focusing on the relationship between a firm?s information extraction and their hiring/firing decisions, our simple model predicts that the average size of transitory demand shocks increase the ...
Working Paper
What are the short-run effects of increasing labor market flexibility?
This paper evaluates the short-run effects of introducing labor market flexibility to an economy characterized by large firing taxes. Different reforms are considered: 1) eliminating all firing taxes, 2) introducing flexible new contracts while retaining the firing taxes on workers employed previous to the reform, and 3) introducing temporary contracts. The paper finds that eliminating all firing taxes increases the unemployment rate much more in the short run than in the long run, that introducing new flexible contracts has similar effects as eliminating all firing taxes, and that ...
Working Paper
Temporary employment and the natural rate of unemployment
This paper examines the determinants of the natural rate of unemployment using a combined cross section and time series data set. The results suggest that industry composition affects the natural rate. In particular, a higher share of temporary employment in a local labor market tends to lower the natural rate of unemployment--most likely through the matching function. The results suggest that the increase in the share of temporary employment may have reduced the natural rate as much as 1/4 percentage point. The results also indicate that unemployment insurance benefits tend to boost the ...
Journal Article
Temporary canary
Growth in the temporary staffing industry fluttered during the recession, and signs of a spring pickup are hard to read.
Working Paper
The growth of temporary services work
Temporary services employment has expanded rapidly and now accounts for a sizable fraction of aggregate employment. The industry's workers are no longer overwhelmingly female or limited to clerical occupations. Temporary work is associated with variable weekly schedules and with part-year participation, but not with voluntarily part-time work. On average, temporary workers have less labor market security than permanent workers, being prone to both more unemployment and more underemployment. Relatively few of them, however, stay in temporary positions for as much as a year and the majority ...