physical appearance and wages do blondes have more fun abstract this study contributes to the economics literature that links physical characteristics to labour market outcomes by investigating the influence of hair colour on women s own wages and also their spouse s wages using u s panel data we find that blonde women receive large wage premiums

macroeconomic linkages taxes and subsidies in the u s agricultural sector lj ar division of agricultural sciences unlversily of califorj ha ma croecono nc linkages t xes and subsidies in tiie u s agr cuttural secl or by gordon c rausser james a chalfant h alan love and kostas g stamoulis tt r i f r in i jq lifor ia agricultura experiment station clmoation of j gricultural economics january 1986

beauty and the labor market the authors examine the impact of looks on earnings using interviewers ratings of respondents physical appearance plain people earn less than average looking people who earn less than the good looking the plainness penalty is 5 to 10 percent slightly larger than the beauty premium effects for men are at least as great as for women unattractive women have lower labor force participation rates and marry men with less human capital better looking people sort into occupations where beauty may be more productive but the impact of individuals looks is mostly independent of occupation suggesting the existence of pure employer discrimination copyright 1994 by american economic association

the right look conservative politicians look better and voters reward it previous research has established that good looking political candidates win more votes we extend this line of research by examining differences between parties on the left and on the right of the political spectrum our study combines data on personal votes in real elections with a web survey in which 2 513 non finnish respondents evaluated the facial appearance of 1 357 finnish political candidates we find that political candidates on the right are better looking in both municipal and parliamentary elections and also have a larger beauty premium in municipal but not in parliamentary elections we discuss possible explanations for these patterns based on the fact that municipal candidates are relatively unknown jel code d72 j45 j70

capital skill complementarity sectoral labor productivity and structural transformation abstract in the postwar u s economy labor productivity has been growing faster in the goods sector versus the service sector this paper argues that this sectoral labor productivity growth gap can largely be explained by the fact that capital intensity also increases faster in the goods sector i build a two sector neoclassical growth model in which capital substitutes low skilled labor but complements high skilled labor and the goods sector is more intensive in low skilled labor relative to the service sector as observed in the data as capital becomes more abundant relative to labor along economic growth low skilled labor is substituted by capital leading to faster growth of capital intensity and hence labor productivity in the goods sector using a calibrated model i find that two thirds of the sectoral labor productivity growth gap can be explained by capital accumulation and its interaction with capital skill complementarity

performance in competitive environments gender differences even though the provision of equal opportunities for men and women has been a priority in many countries large gender differences prevail in competitive high ranking positions suggested explanations include discrimination and differences in preferences and human capital in this paper we present experimental evidence in support of an additional factor women may be less effective than men in competitive environments even if they are able to perform similarly in non competitive environments in a laboratory experiment we observe as we increase the competitiveness of the environment a significant increase in performance for men but not for women this results in a significant gender gap in performance in tournaments while there is no gap when participants are paid according to piece rate this effect is stronger when women have to compete against men than in single sex competitive environments this suggests that women may be able to perform in competitive environments per se

two level ces production technology in the solow and diamond growth models the two level ces aggregate production function that nests a ces into another ces function has recently been used extensively in theoretical and empirical applications of macroeconomics this paper examines its theoretical properties and establishes existence and stability conditions of equilibria under the solow and diamond growth models in addition it examines the efiect of changes in substitution parameters on transitional growth and steady states it is shown that in the solow model the su cient condition for a steady state is fulfllled for a larger range of substitution parameter values than with the basic ces function in the diamond model an increase in substitution parameters results in higher transitional growth under weaker conditions than with the basic ces function

balanced growth despite uzawa i use an event study approach to present novel evidence on the impact of trade liberalization on firm level profits using the uncertainty surrounding the negotiation and ratification process of the canada united states free trade agreement of 1989 cusfta i estimate the impact of different types of tariff reductions on the abnormal returns of canadian manufacturing firms i find that canadian import tariff reductions lead to lower and reductions in canadian intermediate input tariffs to higher abnormal returns the impact of u s tariff reductions is less clear and depends on the size of the affected firms i also calculate the total profit increase implied by my estimates overall cusfta increased per period profits by around 1 2 this was mainly driven by intermediate input tariff reductions which more than offset the negative effect of canadian import tariff reductions

differing degree of price flexibilities and the policy ineffectiveness proposition price regulations impart stickiness to prices the degree of response is analysed for three cpi subindex inflations freely determined regulated and mixed prices and of aggregate cpi inflation to anticipated and unanticipated monetary policies freely determined prices and aggregate cpi show similar responses but faster and larger adjustments than regulated prices to anticipated monetary policies the results imply that the extent to which monetary policies can influence prices depends on the degree of price inertia in various sectors for monetary authorities to control inflation effectively they need to focus on price movements in various sectors

effects of fiscal policies on us agriculture according to the macro rational expectation mre hypothesis only unanticipated macroeconomic policy has impacts on real economic variables and anticipated policy changes have no real impacts this study analysis the effects of the anticipated and unanticipated components of fiscal policy on the us farm real gnp by testing the neutrality and rationality propositions of the mre hypothesis the test results show that both the rationality and neutrality propositions are rejected the empirical findings indicate that the anticipated fiscal policy does have significant effects on farm output examination of a specific sector sheds light on the nature of the market and helps ascertain the resons for the non neutrality

beauty productivity and discrimination lawyers looks and lucre we propose models with an ascriptive characteristic generating earnings differentials and causing sectoral sorting allowing us to distinguish among sources producing such differentials we use longitudinal data on a large sample of graduates from one law school and measure beauty by rating matriculation photographs 1 betterlooking attorneys who graduated in the 1970s earned more than others after 5 years of practice an effect that grew with experience 2 attorneys in the private sector are better looking than those in the public sector differences that rise with age these results support theories of dynamic sorting and customer behavior

capital skill complementarity and balanced growth we construct a general equilibrium version of the krusell et al econometrica 68 1029 2000 model with capital skill complementarity we assume several sources of growth simultaneously exogenous growth of skilled and unskilled labour equipment specific technological progress skilled and unskilled labouraugmenting technological progress and hicks neutral technological progress we derive restrictions that make our model consistent with balanced growth a calibrated version of our model can account for the key growth patterns in the us data including those for capital equipment and structures skilled and unskilled labour and output but it fails to explain the long run behaviour of skilled labour wages and consequently the skill premium

heterogeneity in capital and skills in a neoclassical stochastic growth model does a heterogeneous agents version of a neoclassical model with labor leisure choice replicate the distributions of consumption and working hours observed in the cross sectional data does incorporating heterogeneity enhance the aggregate performance of the representative agent model we address these questions in a complete market model economy with two sources of heterogeneity initial endowments and non acquired skills we find positive answers to both questions

fund raising success and a solicitor s beauty capital do blondes raise more funds abstract this study uses a door to door fund raising field experiment to explore the returns to physical appearance on fund raising success interestingly blonde females earn more on average than brunette counterparts however the returns to physical appearance depend critically on the race of a potential donor

structural change in a multisector model of growth we study a multi sector model of growth with differences in tfp growth rates across sectors and derive sufficient conditions for the coexistence of structural change characterized by sectoral labour reallocation and constant aggregate growth path the conditions are weak restrictions on the utility and production functions commonly applied by macroeconomists we present evidence from us two digit industries that is consistent with our predictions about structural change and successfully calibrate the historical shift from agriculture to manufacturing and services we show quantitatively that reasonable deviations from our conditions do not have a big impact on the properties of the model

why beauty matters we decompose the beauty premium in an experimental labor market where employers determine wages of workers who perform a maze solving task this task requires a true skill which we show to be unaffected by physical attractiveness we find a sizable beauty premium and can identify three transmission channels a physically attractive workers are more confident and higher confidence increases wages b for a given level of confidence physically attractive workers are wrongly considered more able by employers c controlling for worker confidence physically attractive workers have oral skills such as communication and social skills that raise their wages when they interact with employers our methodology can be adopted to study the sources of discriminatory pay differentials in other settings

orchestrating impartiality the impact of blind auditions on female musicians a change in the audition procedures of symphony orchestras adoption of blind auditions with a screen to conceal the candidate s identity from the jury provides a test for sex biased hiring using data from actual auditions in an individual fixed effects framework we find that the screen increases the probability a woman will be advanced and hired although some of our estimates have large standard errors and there is one persistent effect in the opposite direction the weight of the evidence suggests that the blind audition procedure fostered impartiality in hiring and increased the proportion women in symphony orchestras

relative prices and money a vector autoregression on brazilian data recent data on brazilian agricultural prices industrial prices and money supply are analyzed in a vector autoregression the empirical findings show strong one way granger type causality from money supply to agricultural prices while feedback is observed between industrial prices and money supply under the usual monetarist ordering of contemporaneous innovation covariance agricultural prices do not adjust faster than industrial prices to a shock in the money supply

does anticipated monetary policy matter an econometric investigation a heated debate has arisen over the policy ineffectiveness proposition associate with the work of lucas sargent and wallace it postulates that anticipated aggregate demand policy will have no effect on business cycle fluctuations so that one deterministic feedback policy rule is as good as any other from the point of view of stabilizing the economy this paper develops a methodology for empirically analyzing rational expectations models displaying this neutrality result and then applies it to the important question of whether anticipated monetary policy matters to the business cycle

the effect of adolescent experience on labor market outcomes the case of height taller workers receive a wage premium net of differences in family background the disparity is similar in magnitude to the race and gender gaps we exploit variation in an individual s height over time to explore how height affects wages controlling for teen height essentially eliminates the effect of adult height on wages for white men the teen height premium is not explained by differences in resources or endowments the teen height premium is partially mediated through participation in high school sports and clubs we estimate the monetary benefits of a medical treatment for children that increases height

long run implications of investment specific technological change an attempt is made to disentangle its effects from the more traditional hicksneutral form of technological progress the balanced growth path for the model is characterized and calibrated to u s national income and product account nipa data the quantitative analysis suggests that investment specific technological change accounts for the major part of growth jel e13 030 041 047

macroeconomics and agriculture in tunisia this article aims to analyse the impact of changes in the monetary policy and the exchange rate on agricultural supply prices and exports the methodology used is based on the multivariate cointegration approach ten variables are considered interest and exchange rates money supply inflation agricultural output and input prices agricultural supply and exports income and the rate of commercial openness the sample period covers annual data from 1967 to 2002 due to the short sample period two subsystems are considered first long run relationships are identified in each subsystem second both subsystems are merged in order to calculate the short run dynamics the results indicate that changes in macroeconomic variables have an effect on the agricultural sector but the reverse effect does not hold

relative prices and money further results for the united states empirical results support the hypothesis that agricultural prices respond faster than manufactured product prices to a change in money supply in the united states sims vector autoregression var technique was applied in examining this hypothesis the monte carlo integration method was used to test the significance of the impulse responses generated by the var technique

an error correcting model of farmland prices granger has demonstrated that if two variables are integrated of order one and are conitegrated they can be modelled as having been generated by an error correction mechanism cointegration and error correction systems allow long run components of variables to obey equilibrium constraints while short run components are allowed to have flexible dynamic specification using data from five corn belt states in the us we show that farmland prices and cash rents are each integrated of order one and are model is estimated the error correction term is found to be significant in both equations indicating granger causality running in both directions historical simulation of the model is performed the price equation peroformed better although both equations simulate reasonably well

aggregation and stabilization policy in a multi contract economy abstract this paper presents a model of a multi sector economy in which each sector is characterized by a different type of wage or price stickness the various sectors experience the same exogenous shocks and have the same money supply the analysis shows that demand shocks pose no serious problems for stabilization policy in contrast supply shocks may force the policymaker to choose between stability in one sector and stability in another the analysis also shows that the economist as to the economy s underlying structure and obscures the tradeoffs the policymaker must confront in particular a feedback rule chosen on the basis of an aggregate model could be either better or worse than a passive policy

price inertia and policy ineffectiveness in the united states 1890 1980 this paper introduces a new approach to the empirical testing of the lucas sargent wallace lsw policy ineffectiveness proposition which compares the lsw hypothesis with an alternative that states that prices respond fully in the long run but only gradually in the short run to nominal aggregate demand disturbances the empirical equations estimated for a new set of quarterly data extending back to 1890 exhibit uniformly high responses of real output and low responses of price changes to anticipated changes in nominal gnp the paper compares and tests three alternative methods of introducing persistence effects into the lsw framework