bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Vietnamese Manicurists: Are Immigrants Displacing Natives or Finding New Nails to Polish?
Authors: Federman Maya N. , Harrington David E. , Krynski Kathy J.
Published: June 2015

Although many people believe that immigrants displace native workers, most economic research finds that immigration has little or no adverse effect on natives' employment outcomes. An unusual opportunity to explore this question in the context of a narrowly defined labor market is afforded by the influx of Vietnamese immigrants into California's market for manicurists. Over the years 1987–2002, the number of these new entrants (35, 700) slightly exceeded the total number of manicurists in California in 1987 (35, 500). Using data for 34 metropolitan areas over the 16-year period, the authors estimate that for every five Vietnamese who entered the market, two non-Vietnamese were displaced. This displacement appears to have been primarily due to a reduction in the number of non-Vietnamese entering the occupation rather than to an increase in the number of current manicurists leaving it.
Strategy Meets Institutions: The Transformation of Management-Labor Relations at Deutsche Telekom and Ntt
Authors: Sako Mari , Jackson Gregory
Published: June 2015

This comparison of labor-management relations at Deutsche Telekom (DT) and NTT Group (formerly Nippon Telephone and Telegraph) demonstrates the value of considering both institutions and strategic decision-making to understand the interaction between companies and unions. As corporations diversify, multi-divisional or holding company structures emerge, but the degree of diversity introduced in employment relations within the corporate group depends on the interaction between corporate strategy and the strategy of organized labor. The authors' field research, based on interviews with managers and labor leaders, shows that despite a broadly similar corporate strategy of diversification by DT and NTT after the liberalization of telecommunication markets, employment relations became more decentralized—both for unions and for works councils—within the DT group than within the NTT group. This difference in outcomes is explained by the relative power and strategic choices of labor and management, rather than by constraints and opportunities specific to the existing national institutions.
Unionization and Input Flexibility in U.S. Manufacturing, 1973 – 1996
Authors: Magnani Elisabetta , Prentice David
Published: June 2015

Input flexibility, as measured by the ability of firms to vary input demand in the face of changes in input prices, is an important dimension of labor market flexibility. Using a new dataset, the authors analyze the impact of unionization on input flexibility in U.S. manufacturing from 1973 to 1996, a period in which production was arguably becoming more flexible due to deep changes in the U.S. industrial relations system and in the broad macroeconomic environment. The authors quantify the effects of unionization on input flexibility by estimating elasticities of substitution between a broad range of labor and non-labor inputs, controlling for unionization. The pattern that emerges is more complex than that suggested by other research. In particular, low unionization apparently is associated with greater flexibility in the use of labor inputs but less flexibility in the use of non-labor inputs.
Bulls, Bears, and Retirement Behavior
Authors: Coile Courtney C. , Levine Phillip B.
Published: June 2015

The authors examine the relationship between stock market performance and retirement behavior. They first present a descriptive analysis of the wealth holdings of older households and simulate the labor supply response among stockholders necessary to generate observed retirement patterns. Few households, they find, have substantial stock holdings, and these holdings would have to be extremely responsive to market fluctuations to explain observed labor force patterns. The authors then exploit stock market fluctuations since the early 1980s (particularly the boom and bust between 1995 and 2002), along with variation in stock exposure, to generate a double quasi-experiment, comparing the retirement and labor force re-entry patterns over time of those more and less exposed to the market. Any difference in behavior that emerged during the boom should have reversed itself during the bust. The authors find no evidence that changes in the stock market drove aggregate trends in labor supply.
The Effect of Diversity on Turnover: A Large Case Study
Authors: Leonard Jonathan S. , Levine David I.
Published: June 2015

Using longitudinal data collected in 1996–98 from over 800 similar workplaces owned and operated by one corporation, the authors examine how workplace diversity and employee isolation along the dimensions of gender, race, and age affected employee turnover. This design controls for much of the variation in job characteristics and labor markets that have confounded other studies of diversity. The authors use the non-linearity of diversity to distinguish its effect from the main effects of demographic groups and from isolation (being in a numerical minority). The study examines how diversity and isolation by race (white, black, Hispanic, Asian), sex, and age affected different groups. The authors find no consistent evidence that diversity itself increased turnover. In contrast, isolation from coworkers and from customers was often associated with higher turnover.
Investigating the Cause of Death: Industrial Relations and Plant Closures in Australia
Authors: Brown Michelle , Heywood John S.
Published: June 2015

This is the first study to focus on how unions affect the likelihood of plant closures in Australia. Australia is of special interest in this connection, the authors argue, because of its unique industrial relations institutions, which, at the time of the study (1990–95), limited the capacity of established unionized firms to remove unions except through plant closure. An analysis of Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey data shows that two of three measures of unionization had a robust positive influence on the probability of plant closure, and the third had a weaker positive influence. Depending on the specification, for example, a 10 percentage point increase in union density (one of the two measures found to have strong influence) was associated with a 1.3–1.7 percentage point increase in the probability of plant closure—representing a substantial increment, since the mean closure probability among these plants was about 16%.
The Adoption of Job Rotation: Testing the Theories
Authors: Eriksson Tor , Ortega Jaime
Published: June 2015

This paper tests three possible explanations for why firms adopt job rotation: employee learning (rotation makes employees more versatile), employer learning (through rotation, employers learn more about individual workers' strengths), and employee motivation (rotation mitigates boredom). Whereas previous studies have examined either establishment characteristics or a single firm's personnel records, this study merges information from a detailed survey of Danish private sector firms with linked employer-employee panel data, allowing firm characteristics, work force characteristics, and firms' human resource management practices to be included as explanatory variables. The results reject the employee motivation hypothesis, but support the employee learning and, especially, the employer learning hypotheses. Firms allocating more resources to training were more likely to rotate workers; rotation schemes were more common in less hierarchical firms and in firms with shorter average employee tenure; and both firm growth rates and firms' use of nation-wide recruitment were positively associated with rotation schemes.
Real Wage Cyclicality of Job Stayers, Within-Company Job Movers, and Between-Company Job Movers
Authors: Devereux Paul J. , Hart Robert A.
Published: June 2015

Using the British New Earnings Survey Panel Data for 1975–2001, the authors estimate the wage cyclicality (the degree to which wage levels rise and fall with economic upturns and downturns) of three groups: job stayers, within-company job movers, and between-company job movers. Wages of internal movers, they find, were slightly more procyclical, and wages of external movers considerably more procyclical, than those of stayers. The greater cyclicality of movers' wages is particularly apparent for private sector workers and persons not covered by collective agreements. Nevertheless, because job stayers comprised about 90% of all observations in this large sample of British workers, the procyclicality of their wages was the predominant determinant of the overall procyclical pattern found across all groups. Thus, the analysis does not support the implication of some rigid wage models that employers use job title changes to adjust wages to the business cycle.
Families, Human Capital, and Small Business: Evidence from the Characteristics of Business Owners Survey
Authors: Fairlie Robert W. , Robb Alicia
Published: June 2015

Recent research has concluded that the children of business owners are substantially more likely than others to become self-employed themselves. The authors of this study find that more than half of business owners in the confidential, restricted-access 1992 Characteristics of Business Owners Survey had a self-employed family member before starting their business. Of the group with a self-employed family member, fewer than half had worked in that family member's business, suggesting that the intergenerational link in self-employment is not primarily due to the acquisition of general and specific business human capital. In contrast, the success of small businesses owned by those surveyed was only weakly correlated with having a self-employed family member, but strongly correlated with prior work experience in a family member's business, which is one method of acquiring general and specific business human capital. Another finding is that only 1.6% of the small businesses surveyed were inherited.
Promotions and Incentives in Nonprofit and for-Profit Organizations
Authors: Devaro Jed , Brookshire Dana
Published: June 2015

Using data from the 1992–95 Multi-City Study of Urban Inequality, an employer survey, the authors document a new empirical finding that workers are less likely to receive promotions in nonprofit organizations than in for-profit firms. The study also uncovers evidence that wage increases associated with promotion were of comparable magnitudes in the two sectors, as was the potential for within-job wage growth; nonprofits were less likely than for-profits to base promotions on job performance or merit; nonprofits were less likely to use output-contingent incentive contracts to motivate workers; and the observed difference in promotion rates between the nonprofit and for-profit sectors was more pronounced for high-skilled than for low-skilled workers. The authors also propose a theory that potentially explains the broad pattern of evidence they uncover, based on the idea that nonprofit workers are more intrinsically motivated (attracted to their work for reasons transcending material compensation) than are for-profit workers.
Examining Non-Linear Relationships between Human Resource Practices and Manufacturing Performance
Authors: Chadwick Clint
Published: June 2015

One little-explored question concerning innovative human resources practices is how the intensity of their implementation affects their impact on establishment performance: is the relationship linear, or more complex? This analysis, using U.S. Census Bureau data for 1997 from a sample of 1,212 private sector manufacturing establishments, investigates the possibility of non-linearities in the relationship between establishment performance and six human resource practices. The author finds departures from linearity that are both statistically significant and substantively meaningful for four of the six practices. He concludes that linear estimations of these relationships could mislead theorists and result in faulty recommendations to practitioners.
Estimating Compensating Wage Differentials Using Voluntary Job Changes: Evidence from Germany
Authors: Villanueva Ernesto
Published: June 2015

The author develops a model predicting that in a labor market that attaches a wage premium to jobs with a disamenity (a compensating wage differential), the premium's upper bound will be defined by the average wage change of voluntary job movers whose consumption of the disamenity rises as a result of their move; its lower bound, by the wage change of those whose consumption of the disamenity falls. These predictions will not hold if, as predicted by a “segmented” labor market model, the labor market attaches a wage penalty to workplace disamenities. Using longitudinal data on job characteristics and wages in Germany in 1984–2001, the author estimates the market returns to four workplace disamenities: heavy workload, job insecurity, poor hours regulation, and a mismatch between skills possessed and skills required. The results broadly support the existence of compensating differentials in the German labor market.
Wage Growth Due to Human Capital Accumulation and Job Search: A Comparison between the United States and Germany
Authors: Schönberg Uta
Published: June 2015

This paper compares the sources of wage growth of young male workers in two countries with very different labor market institutions, the United States and Germany. The author first develops a simple method for decomposing wage growth into components due to general human capital accumulation, firm-specific human capital accumulation, and job search. The empirical analysis uses data from administrative records (Germany) and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (United States) for cohorts entering the labor market in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Although the two countries differed substantially in mobility rates, they were similar in the sources of wage growth, with general human capital accumulation being the most important single source and job search accounting for an additional 25% or more of total wage growth. There is no evidence that returns to firm-specific human capital accumulation were higher for German apprentices than for U.S. high school dropouts or graduates.
Testing the Morale Theory of Nominal Wage Rigidity
Authors: Kawaguchi Daiji , Ohtake Fumio
Published: June 2015

This paper tests the morale theory of nominal wage rigidity, according to which firms resist making nominal cuts to workers' pay even in adverse economic conditions because such cuts hurt worker morale and productivity. The authors analyze data from an employer-employee survey they conducted in Japan in 2000. That year coincided with a rare spell of deflationary recession, which, the authors argue, is a good setting in which to study how nominal pay cuts affect morale. They find that a nominal annual pay freeze, experienced by 21% of the sampled workers, demoralized workers by reducing their trust in the firm, and that even greater demoralization—not wholly attributable to reduced trust—was associated with a nominal pay cut, which affected 17% of the workers. The observed negative relationship between nominal pay cuts and morale persists even when the estimation includes controls and firm fixed effects.
Are Franchises Bad Employers?
Authors: Cappelli Peter , Hamori Monika
Published: June 2015

Franchise jobs are often viewed as epitomizing a “low-road” employee-management approach characterized by high turnover and several practices that are deemed unsophisticated, such as low investment in training, deskilling of work, and little encouragement of employee involvement. Research on franchise operations suggests, however, that the basic operating principles and practices of franchises tend to be more sophisticated than those of equivalent independent operators. Might their employee management practices be more advanced as well, notwithstanding the stereotype of franchise jobs? This study uses data from a national probability sample of establishments, drawn from surveys conducted in the mid-1990s, to examine the relationship between franchise status and employment practices. Descriptive statistics suggest that franchise operations used low-road practices, but once industry, size, and other control variables are included in the analysis, these operations appear to have offered better jobs with more sophisticated systems of employee management than did similar non-franchise operations.
The Impact of Minimum Wages on Employment in a Low-Income Country: A Quasi-Natural Experiment in Indonesia
Authors: Alatas Vivi , Cameron Lisa A.
Published: June 2015

The extensive literature on the employment impact of minimum wages has focused heavily on industrialized nations and very little on the developing world, despite the importance of minimum wages in many low-income countries. One such country, Indonesia, was the setting for an unusual quasi-natural experiment: not only did minimum wages in Indonesia increase sharply between 1990 and 1996, but the resultant increment in average wages varied markedly across different areas in Greater Jakarta. The authors use household-level labor market data to determine the extent of compliance with the legislation, then estimate the employment impact in the clothing, textiles, footwear, and leather industries based on a census of all large and medium-sized establishments. The evidence suggests that there was no negative employment impact for large establishments, either foreign or domestic, but that workers in smaller, domestic establishments may have suffered job losses as a result of minimum wage increases.
Wage Differentials, Skills, and Institutions in Low-Skill Jobs
Authors: Maxwell Nan L.
Published: June 2015

The typical study of wage differentials examines workers at all educational levels and attends closely to the link between education and wages. Little research has looked at determinants of wage differentials specifically among workers with low educational attainment. This study, using the 1998–2002 Bay Area Longitudinal Surveys and the 2001–2003 Occupational Information Network, examines which skills and labor market institutions affected wages in jobs for individuals with a high school education or less and little work experience. The author finds that jobs demanding office/clerical skills, mechanical skills, or the “new basic” skills of reading, math, problem-solving, and communication paid higher wages, on average, than did other low-skill jobs, especially those in which physical skills were relatively important. Also positively associated with wages for these low-skilled workers were union representation and location in an industry containing relatively few low-skill jobs.
Are Two Carrots Better Than One? The Effects of Adding Employment Services to Financial Incentive Programs for Welfare Recipients
Authors: Robins Philip K. , Michalopoulos Charles , Foley Kelly
Published: June 2015

The Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP) was a social experiment conducted in two Canadian provinces during the 1990s that tested a generous financial incentive program for welfare recipients. A little-known subsidiary experiment, called SSP Plus, had a three-way design that tested the incremental effect of adding employment services to the generous financial incentive program. Employment services are viewed by many welfare analysts as an important component of an overall strategy for helping welfare recipients escape poverty and achieve stable employment. This paper presents the results of the SSP Plus experiment. Adding employment services encouraged more people to take up the earnings supplement, and it appeared to have long-term effects on full-time employment and welfare receipt. This might be because the services improved the jobs people obtained. Compared to program participants who lacked the added services, SSP Plus members had higher earnings and wage rates, and also appear to have held more sustainable jobs.
The Dispersion of Employees' Wage Increases and Firm Performance
Authors: Grund Christian , Westergaard-Nielsen Niels
Published: June 2015

Previous studies examining intra-firm wage dispersion and firm performance have focused on wage levels. The authors of this study argue that for purposes of comparing wage dispersion's positive incentive effects with its adverse morale effects, the dispersion of wage increases is more revealing than the dispersion of wage levels. It is reasonable to expect greater dispersion of wage increases to be associated with higher monetary incentives, but also with increased perceptions of unfairness. The authors' analysis of linked employer-employee data from Denmark for the years 1992–97 shows that the dispersion of wage growth within firms generally had a negative association with firm performance. The results are robust across industries and categories of firm size, but are mainly driven by white-collar rather than blue-collar workers.
Should Workers Care about Firm Size?
Authors: Ferrer Ana , Lluis Stéphanie
Published: June 2015

The authors analyze how firms of different sizes reward measured skills and unmeasured ability. The empirical methodology, based on nonlinear instrumental variable estimation, permits direct estimation of the returns to unmeasured ability by firm size. An analysis of panel data from the Canadian Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics for two periods, 1993–1998 and 1996–2001, reveals statistically significant differences between firms of different sizes. In particular, returns to unmeasured ability are higher in medium-sized firms than in either small firms or large firms. The authors find that the firm-size wage gap and the differential in returns to unmeasured ability between small and medium-sized firms is mainly explained by ability sorting. The fact that larger firms reward ability less than medium-sized firms is consistent with an explanation based on monitoring costs. When firms become “too large,” monitoring costs may prevent them from rewarding ability directly through wages.
How Successful Have Trade Unions Been? A Utility-Based Indicator of Union Well-Being
Authors: Pencavel John
Published: June 2015

Can conventional economic analysis help in defining and measuring the success of labor unions? In this paper, a general indicator of union welfare is proposed and particular expressions for the wage and employment objectives of unions are rearranged to derive measures of union success or welfare. These indicators combine two measures: union density and the relative union-nonunion wage gap. The indicators are applied to describe the movement of union welfare in the United States over the past eighty years, the differences in union success among groups of U.S. workers, and the variation in union well-being across countries. The results suggest that U.S. unions' success peaked in the 1950s and 1960s; they have tended to benefit black workers, especially black men, more than other groups; and in recent decades a very low unionization rate has contributed to make them less successful, overall, than unions in other countries with similar labor markets.
Nlrb Elections versus Card Check Campaigns: Results of a Worker Survey
Authors: Eaton Adrienne E. , Kriesky Jill
Published: June 2015

The authors evaluate policy arguments for and against the use of card check as a method to determine union recognition. The results of an analysis of data from telephone surveys of 430 workers who had been through the NLRB election or card check campaigns of six unions in 2003 indicate that there was little undue union pressure to support unionization in card check campaigns, and that management pressure on workers to oppose unionization was considerably greater than pressure from co-workers or organizers to support the union in both card checks and elections. The authors also find that although workers in card checks do appear to have had somewhat less information about unions and about the recognition process than workers in elections, workers who felt they had insufficient information to make a decision about unionization tended not to sign cards.
The Wage Effects of Personal Smoking History
Authors: Grafova Irina B. , Stafford Frank P.
Published: June 2015

This study explores determinants of the wage penalty borne by smokers. The authors reconstruct individual smoking histories by pooling PSID (Panel Study of Income Dynamics) data for 1986–2001. They find no wage gap between former smokers and those who had never smoked, but statistically significant wage gaps between smokers who would continue smoking and three other groups: those who would later quit smoking, those who had quit smoking already, and those who never smoked. The wage penalty for smoking, observed in the 1986 cross-section, is largely driven by those who would continue smoking over the years 1986–2001. These results suggest that the smoker/nonsmoker wage differential observed at any given time may be driven by a non-causal explanation rather than by smoking per se. For example, persistent smokers may be characterized by myopia that leads to reduced investment in health capital and firm-specific or other human capital.
The Globalization of Service Work: Comparative Institutional Perspectives on Call Centers
Authors: Batt Rosemary , Holman David , Holtgrewe Ursula
Published: June 2015

This introduction to the special issue on the globalization of service work provides an overview of the call center sector and its development in coordinated, liberal market, and emerging market economies. The introduction's authors situate this research in literature on the comparative political economy and industrial relations. Drawing on qualitative research and a unique survey of 2,500 establishments in 17 countries conducted in 2003–2006, they discuss the extent of convergence and divergence in management practices and employment relations. They also describe the research methodology for the overall research project, highlight its major findings, and summarize the contributions of the thematic papers covering several topics: unions' role in shaping the quality of jobs; the factors that influence wage levels and wage inequality; the uses of contingent employment and their outcomes; the relationships among strategic human resource management, work design, and organizational outcomes; and the relationships among technology, selection, and training.
The Effects of Institutional and Organizational Characteristics on Work Force Flexibility: Evidence from Call Centers in Three Liberal Market Economies
Authors: Van Jaarsveld Danielle D. , Kwon Hyunji , Frost Ann C.
Published: June 2015

This comparative study examines survey data from 464 call centers in the United States, 167 in the United Kingdom, and 387 in Canada to explore two questions: whether institutional differences shape employers' choices of ways to improve work force flexibility, both numerical and functional; and whether strategies for numerical flexibility and functional flexibility are related. The results suggest that institutional differences across these liberal market economies—specifically, in dismissal regulations and union strength—did affect how employers chose to achieve work force flexibility. For example, the use of part-time workers was more common in countries with more stringent rules regulating dismissals. Organizational characteristics also mattered, with outsourced firms being more likely than in-house firms to use part-time workers. Evidence also suggests that managers used numerical flexibility and functional flexibility strategies as substitutes: higher employee job discretion was associated with both lower dismissal rates and a lower likelihood of temporary use.
Is Digital Technology Reshaping Employment Systems in U.S. Telecommunications Network Services?
Authors: Keefe Jeffrey H.
Published: June 2015

The four major telecommunications local networks and network services—fixed wire line, wireless, cable television, and the Internet—are undergoing transformations propelled by network digitalization, service competition, and corporate consolidations. Using data from surveys conducted in 1998 and 2003, together with field interviews, site visits at major telecommunications firms, and discussions with industry experts, regulators, and analysts, the author examines how these forces reshaped technician employment systems across these formerly specialized telecommunications networks and services. The principal finding is that despite rising inter-network competition and common digital technologies, most of these networks' fundamental employment systems continued with little change. Consistent with predictions from an evolutionary perspective on institutional change, the three facilities-based networks—wireless, cable television distribution, and wire line—maintained distinctive employment systems “imprinted” by their respective institutional histories, while the Internet Service Providers exhibited fragmentation reflecting their meteoric rise and the industry's current business difficulties and uncertain future.
Faculty Salaries in Ontario: Compression, Inversion, and the Effects of Alternative Forms of Representation
Authors: Martinello Felice
Published: June 2015

The author estimates the incidence of salary compression and inversion, and the effects of different forms of collective representation (unions and special plans, with and without binding arbitration), for faculty at Ontario universities over the 1970–2004 period. The data show large decreases in the salary differential between full and associate professors and severe compression and inversion in age-salary profiles in the 2000s. Union representation had no effect on salaries compared to no formal representation. Special plans without binding arbitration led to lower salaries, while special plans with binding arbitration yielded higher salaries, but all of the estimated effects were small. Average salaries were lower the higher the proportion of female faculty in the 1970s, but this effect became statistically insignificant by the early 1990s. Finally, faculty salaries responded to the cost of living in the university's city, and were higher, on average, in universities with higher average research productivity.
Avoiding Labor Shortages by Employer Signaling: On the Importance of Good Work Climate and Labor Relations
Authors: Backes-Gellner Uschi , Tuor Simone N.
Published: June 2015

Reversing the original signaling model, this study explains how employers signal the non-observable quality of their workplace and thereby reduce labor shortages. Based on a company data set of 204 German firms, the authors find, as predicted by their theory, that the existence of a works council, an apprenticeship training program, and a high-quality incumbent workforce significantly improves recruitment success because they all reliably signal appealing workplaces. At the same time, frequent hiring of workers with non-matching qualifications reduces recruitment success because it signals low-quality workplaces. The authors' research reveals that certain aspects of labor relations and workplace characteristics exert a significant impact on recruitment success, which cannot be explained by conventional theoretical arguments.
Firms' Innovation Activity and Numerical Flexibility
Authors: Altuzarra Amaia , Serrano Felipe
Published: June 2015

This study investigates the relationship between manufacturing firms' innovation activity (measured by product innovation, process innovation, and R&D activities) and their numerical flexibility (proxied by the rate of fixed-term contracts). Estimates using data from Spain's Survey on Firms' Strategies (EESE) for the years 2000–2002 reveal a non-monotonic relationship: a firm's probability of innovating and carrying out R&D increased as the rate of use of temporary and other non-core workers increased, but only up to a threshold, beyond which this probability decreased.
Reframing the Representation Debate: Going beyond Union and Non-Union Options
Authors: Mironi Mordehai
Published: June 2015

The author argues for replacing the traditional union/non-union dichotomy with a more dynamic, nuanced typology of employment relationships and for viewing the contemporary workplace as an organization with multiple distinct but interacting employment models. Such a framework has clear potential advantages for the public policy debate as well as for those making a strategic choice of employment relations models. Moreover, the framework benefits researchers who may use it to refine their empirical studies of the diverse forms and combinations of representation and voice in contemporary workplaces in order to determine which perform best in different settings for different work groups. The real alternative to union organization, the author suggests, is not “no unions” or lack of representation, but some innovative form of representation and voice. Whether these alternatives are sustainable and powerful enough to do the job remains an empirical question that the field should be tackling with greater clarity and vigor.
Changing Levels or Changing Slopes? The Narrowing of the Gender Earnings Gap 1959 – 1999
Authors: Weinberger Catherine J. , Kuhn Peter J.
Published: June 2015

Once educational attainment and other observable characteristics have been controlled for, studies show that the gender wage gap among adult full-time workers is about half the size it was in 1980. Using U.S. Census and Current Population Survey (CPS) data from 1959 through 1999, the authors investigate the extent to which the decline in this gap was associated with changes across cohorts in the relative rate of wage growth after labor market entry (slopes), versus changes in relative earnings levels at labor market entry (levels). They find that slope changes associated with post-schooling investments, including work experience, account for no more than one-third of the narrowing of the gender wage gap over the past 40 years. The majority of the narrowing can be attributed to factors present at the time that successive cohorts entered the labor market, such as a growing demand for women's unobserved skills or declining discrimination.
Do Friends and Relatives Really Help in Getting a Good Job?
Authors: Pellizzari Michele
Published: June 2015

The available empirical evidence on the wage effect of finding jobs through informal contacts is mixed. This author theorizes that, depending upon the efficiency of formal search methods, the use of personal contacts can lead either to a wage premium or to a wage penalty. Using data from the European Community Household Panel (ECHP), the author finds new evidence to suggest that across many of the countries in the European Union, premiums and penalties to finding jobs through personal contacts are equally frequent and are of about the same size. Such cross-country variation seems to reflect differences in the efficiency of formal search channels. In particular, the wage effect of finding jobs through personal contacts is higher in countries with more labor market intermediaries. Differences-in-differences estimates based on the Italian liberalization of the labor recruitment industry confirm this result.
On-the-Job Tasks and Performance Pay: A Vacancy-Level Analysis
Authors: Brenčič Vera , Norris John Brian
Published: June 2015

Drawing on a dataset of job openings posted at an online job board, the authors find that employers are less likely to offer performance-based pay when a job entails multitasking, quality control, or team work than when a job does not entail these tasks. This finding is consistent with the notion that when employers have difficulty measuring a worker's overall performance at jobs with these dimensions, they offer weaker performance incentives to ensure that workers allocate their efforts to every task they were hired to perform. The observed pattern persists when different forms of performance incentives are considered, such as bonuses and commissions, but is weaker for non-sales jobs or jobs that entail multitasking.
The Long Haul Effects of Interest Arbitration: The Case of New York State's Taylor Law
Authors: Kochan Thomas , Lipsky David B. , Newhart Mary , Benson Alan
Published: June 2015

The authors examine debates about the effects of mandatory interest arbitration on police and firefighters in New York State under the Taylor Law from 1974 to 2007. Comparing experience with interest arbitration in the first three years after the law was adopted with experiences from 1995 to 2007, the authors find that no strikes occurred under arbitration and that rates of dependence on arbitration declined considerably. Moreover, the effectiveness of mediation prior to and during arbitration remained high, the tripartite arbitration structure continued to foster discussion of options for resolution among arbitration panel members, and wage increases awarded under arbitration matched those negotiated voluntarily by the parties. Econometric estimates of the effects of interest arbitration on wage changes in a national sample suggest wage increases differed little in states with arbitration from those without it. The authors therefore propose a role for interest arbitration in national labor policy.
Teams, Incentive Pay, and Productive Efficiency: Evidence from a Food-Processing Plant
Authors: Jones Derek C. , Kalmi Panu , Kauhanen Antti
Published: June 2015

By using weekly records on efficiency for four production lines in a Finnish food-processing plant during the period 1999–2005, the authors investigate the effects on production line performance once changes in Human Resource Management (HRM) practices were instituted. Using time-series methods to estimate structural change models, the authors were able to determine the extent to which specific HR policies—the introduction of teams, company-wide profit-sharing, and a group system of performance-related pay (PRP)—affected workers' efficiency, even though production technology remained the same. As predicted, the authors found that in three of the four production lines, when PRP was added to teams, productivity increased from between 9 and 20%, highlighting the importance of the complementarity between employee participation and incentive pay.
Hourly versus Salaried Payment and Decisions about Trading Time and Money over Time
Authors: Devoe Sanford E. , Lee Byron Y. , Pfeffer Jeffrey
Published: June 2015

Using longitudinal data from the British Household Panel Survey, the authors examine how individuals' employment compensation—salaried or hourly—affects their decisions to trade time for money. Results indicate that there is a positive association between hourly wages and a desire to exchange leisure time for more money. This relationship holds even when a fixed-effects model controls for unobserved differences among individuals as well as for job-relevant factors, including income, hours worked, tenure, and satisfaction. Evidence also suggests that after changing jobs in which pay schemes change from hourly to salaried, individuals' preferences remain the same in the short term, but effects of these preferences do decay over time, consistent with the notion of psychological salience.
An Empirical Analysis of Risk, Incentives and the Delegation of Worker Authority
Authors: Devaro Jed , Kurtulus Fidan Ana
Published: June 2015

The authors empirically test Prendergast's (2002) theory that incorporates the delegation of worker authority into the principal-agent model to explain the lack of consistent empirical support for a tradeoff between risk and incentives. Using data from the 1998 British WERS, the authors investigate whether there is: 1) evidence of a risk-incentives tradeoff as predicted by the principal-agent model; 2) evidence of a positive relationship between incentive pay and the delegation of worker authority; 3) evidence of a positive relationship between risk and authority; 4) support for the main testable implication of Prendergast's model, namely that the evidence favoring a risk-incentives tradeoff should strengthen when authority controls are added to the empirical model. The answers are affirmative for all four questions, thereby providing evidence clarifying the relationship between risk and incentive pay and how managers optimally bundle incentive pay and the delegation of worker decision rights to cope with risk.
Representation of Women Faculty at Public Research Universities: Do Unions Matter?
Authors: May Ann Mari , Moorhouse Elizabeth A. , Bossard Jennifer A.
Published: June 2015

The authors investigate the impact of unionization on the representation of women faculty at public Carnegie Doctoral/Research-Extensive institutions in the United States from 1993–94 through 2004–05. Using institutional-level data from the American Association of University Professors and controlling for important characteristics that influence the gender composition of faculty, the authors find that important differences exist in the proportion of women faculty in total and by rank in unionized versus non-unionized settings. Specifically, unionized public research universities have a higher proportion of women faculty overall and at the ranks of associate and full professor than do non-unionized schools. The authors suggest that this issue is better understood using a segmented labor market approach since previous studies conducted on the subject may have obscured differences by rank. The results of this study reflect the historical priorities of the faculty union in formalizing tenure and promotion procedures, and suggest that these procedures are especially important for women faculty.
First-Timers and Late-Bloomers: Youth—Adult Unionization Differences in a Cohort of the U.S. Labor Force
Authors: Booth Jonathan E. , Budd John W. , Munday Kristen M.
Published: June 2015

The authors analyze youth-adult unionization differences by using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79) to follow a single group of individuals from age 15/16 to 40/41. They find that the differences between youth and adults are greatest at ages 15 to 17 and largely disappear by age 23. Though currently unionized workers are most likely to be in their forties or fifties, the authors find that younger workers have a greater opportunity or are more inclined to be unionized than adults and that many individuals report having had a unionized job by the age of 25. The authors also find that whereas the stock of unionized workers is largest at middle age, the flow of workers into unionized jobs is greatest between the ages of 16 and 25.
The Theoretical Foundation of Industrial Relations and its Implications for Labor Economics and Human Resource Management
Authors: Kaufman Bruce E.
Published: June 2015

The author identifies the core principle that forms the theoretical and policy foundation for the field of industrial relations—labor is embodied in human beings and is not a commodity—and argues that the field's two central dependent variables are labor problems and the employment relationship. Next, he uses this core principle, along with complementary ideas from institutional economics, to develop a theoretical framework that not only explains the nature of the employment relationship and labor problems but also reveals shortcomings in related theories from labor economics and human resource management. Finally, this framework is used to derive the “fundamental theorem” of industrial relations, demonstrate that optimal economic performance occurs in a mixed economy of imperfect labor markets and organizations, and show that a certain amount of labor protectionism promotes economic efficiency and human welfare.
Workers, Firms, or Institutions: What Determines Job Duration for Male Employees in Germany?
Authors: Boockmann Bernhard , Steffes Susanne
Published: June 2015

The authors examine job durations of German workers using the Linked Employer-Employee Data of the Institute of Employment Research (LIAB). Results indicate that exit rates are strongly influenced by firm characteristics, such as the existence of works councils and the opportunity for further training. The effects of these characteristics, however, are limited to jobs held by blue-collar workers or by those possessing vocation-educational skills. Changes in coefficients across specifications provide clear evidence for a sorting process whereby workers with long expected job durations are matched to firms offering stable employment and vice versa. An extension of the model to a competing-risks framework shows that both individual-and firm-level characteristics differ greatly in their effects on worker job exits to unemployment and to new jobs. Evidence suggests that works councils decrease exits to both states, but only for blue-collar workers.
Membership Has its Privileges? Contracting and Access to Jobs That Accommodate Work-Life Needs
Authors: Briscoe Forrest , Wardell Mark , Sawyer Steve
Published: June 2015

Using job-spell data based on an original survey of Information Technology (IT) degree graduates from five U.S. universities, the authors investigate the link between contracting and a set of job characteristics (accommodating flexible work hours, total work hours, and working from home) associated with work-life needs. Compared with regular employees in similar jobs, workers in both independent- and agency-contracting jobs report more often working at home and working fewer hours per week. Further, agency contracting (but not independent contracting) is associated with lower odds of being able to set one's own work hours. Important differences also emerge in workplaces of varying sizes. For each job characteristic, as workplace size increases, independent contracting jobs deteriorate relative to regular employment jobs. As a consequence, in large workplaces, independent contracting jobs appear to be less accommodating of work-life needs than regular employment jobs.
The Impact of International Outsourcing on Unionization and Wages: Evidence from the Apparel Export Sector in Central America
Authors: Anner Mark
Published: June 2015

It is often assumed that manufacturing workers in developing countries, as recipients of outsourced jobs, would achieve economic benefits and organizational power. The author argues that job growth in developing countries through outsourcing to competing firms has often actually resulted in declining unionization and lower wage rates relative to traditional, integrated manufacturing firms. Using time-series data on union membership from 1980–2003 for Honduras and El Salvador as well as 2004 Household Survey Data for El Salvador, he examines the determinants of unionization rates and wages in the manufacturing sectors. He finds that that competitive outsourcing hurts labor at the plant-level in three ways: 1) it reduces labor's strike leverage by geographically dispersing the production process; 2) it increases the threat of plant mobility by decreasing plant-level investments; and 3) it increases labor costs relative to total costs, which creates an incentive for employers to keep wages low and unions out.
Earning Trajectories of Highly Educated Immigrants: Does Place of Education Matter?
Authors: Kaushal Neeraj
Published: June 2015

The author compares the earnings and earning trajectories of U.S. college-educated immigrants with those of similar immigrants who completed their education abroad using cross-sectional and longitudinal data from the 1993 and 2003 National Surveys of College Graduates. Adjusting for demographics, results based on cross-sectional data suggest that the annual earnings of college-educated, foreign-born men were 9% less than those of similar U.S.-born men whereas the annual earnings of college-educated foreign-born women were 3% less than those of similar U.S.-born women. After further adjusting for place of education, however, the gap narrowed by 42% for men and vanished for women. An analysis of longitudinal data reveals that in the first 15 years after arrival, U.S.-educated, foreign-born science and engineering (S&E) professionals had higher earnings growth (relative to native-born S&E professionals) than their foreign-educated counterparts. Evidence also indicates that attrition was associated with labor market performance. Of those in the sample, U.S.-educated S&E professionals who stayed had higher earnings than those who exited.