Search Results
Working Paper
The between firm effect with multiproduct firms
This paper studies the multi-product firms with two factors of production: unskilled and skilled labor (talent). Creating new products is skill intensive while production is less skill intensive. By introducing these two tasks a firm operates which act as two seemingly sectors, we show here a new effect: an increase in the skilled labor supply, relatively to unskilled labor, could reduce the number of products but increase the average scale per product. The relative strength of this effect depends on the degree of firm heterogeneity and the extent to which we allow multiple product within the ...
Journal Article
Interview with James J. Heckman
Nobel prize-winning economist James J. Heckman on discrimination, job training and early childhood education.
Working Paper
Boomerang kids: labor market dynamics and moving back home
This paper examines the relationship between the dynamics of parent-youth living arrangements and labor market outcomes for youths who do not go to college in the United States. The data come from a newly constructed panel data set based on retrospective monthly coresidence questions in the NLSY97. This is the first data set containing information on the labor market circumstances of youths at the time of movements in and out of the parental home. Based on estimates from duration models that allow for unobserved heterogeneity, I find that moving from employment to non-employment increases the ...
Speech
Job polarization in the region
Remarks at the Quarterly Regional Economic Press Briefing, New York City.
Journal Article
Why Johnny can’t work
Journal Article
The economic value of education by race and ethnicity
Using data from the U.S. Census and the National Longitudinal Surveys, the authors find little evidence of differences in the economic value of education across racial and ethnic groups, even with attempts to control for ability and measurement error biases. As a result, they argue, policies that increase education among the low-skilled, who are disproportionately African American and Hispanic, have a good possibility of increasing their economic well-being and reducing inequality.
Working Paper
A quantitative theory of the gender gap in wages
Using panel data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), we document that gender differences in wages almost double during the first 20 years of labor market experience and that there are substantial gender differences in employment and hours of work during the life cycle. A large portion of gender differences in labor market attachment can be traced to the impact of children on the labor supply of women. We develop a quantitative life-cycle model of fertility, labor supply, and human capital accumulation decisions. We use this model to assess the role of fertility on gender ...
Journal Article
Wage Growth, Labor Market Tightness, and Inflation: A Service Sector Analysis
This Economic Commentary explores the connections among labor market tightness, wage inflation, and price inflation at the service sector level. Across most service sectors, sector-specific labor market tightness and nominal wage growth have been above prepandemic averages since 2022. The data suggest that a stronger positive relationship between labor market tightness and wage growth has emerged in the aftermath of the pandemic. The relationship between sector-specific wage growth and inflation is more varied. In the education and health services sector, higher wage growth is associated with ...
Journal Article
Advance Layoff Notice Provision and the WARN Act
We find that the incidence of advance layoff notice more than doubled in the years following the passage of the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act. Geographic variation confirms that the act was likely responsible for this increase. We also find that state-level mini-WARN Acts that increased notification coverage had no discernible effect on the incidence of advance notice in these states. But the mini-WARN Act in New York that increased the required length of notice resulted in a commensurate increase in advance notice for affected workers.
Journal Article
How Insured Are Workers Against Unemployment? Unemployment Insurance and the Distribution of Liquid Wealth
In this Economic Commentary, we analyze the relationship between unemployment insurance (UI) recipiency and insurance by examining the wealth distribution of workers who have been through an unemployment spell. We focus on the net liquid wealth gap between recipients and nonrecipients of UI along the income distribution of the unemployed. Using recent data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation at the individual level, we estimate that UI recipients at the bottom half of the income distribution tend to have higher median net liquid wealth than nonrecipients, putting nonrecipients ...