bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Gender Differences in Promotion on a Job Ladder: Evidence from Finnish Metalworkers
Authors: Pekkarinen Tuomas , Vartiainen Juhana
Published: June 2015

This paper, using panel data on Finnish metalworkers for the years 1990–2000, explores gender differences in the allocation of workers across jobs of different complexity. The data provide measures for the complexity of the workers' tasks and for the individual productivity of each worker. The results indicate that women were less likely to be promoted than men who started their careers in similar tasks. A productivity comparison shows that there was no gender-related productivity differential at the time of the initial assignment, but that women became, on average, more productive than men afterward, in the subsets both of promoted workers and of non-promoted workers. The most plausible interpretation of these results, the authors argue, is that women faced a higher promotion threshold than men. Consistent with this interpretation, they find that the quit rate for young female workers was higher than that for young men.
How Flexible are Wages in Response to Local Unemployment in South Africa?
Authors: Kingdon Geeta Gandhi , Knight John
Published: June 2015

It is commonly claimed that the South African labor market is unusually inflexible owing to the strength of the country's unions and the system of centralized collective bargaining. One sign of labor market inflexibility is low responsiveness of wages to local unemployment. Analyzing data from the South African Living Standards Survey, the authors find that the elasticity of wages with respect to local unemployment rates in South Africa in 1993 was about-0.1. The similarity of this elasticity to that found in other countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, is surprising given South Africa's national unemployment rate of over 30%. The wage curve elasticity persists over a much wider range of unemployment rates in South Africa than in OECD countries, implying that unemployment in South Africa can have a large impact on wages.
Mass Migration to Israel and Natives' Employment Transitions
Authors: Cohen-Goldner Sarit , Paserman M. Daniele
Published: June 2015

This study examines how mass migration from the former Soviet Union to Israel affected natives' probability of moving from employment to non-employment and vice-versa. Using 1989–99 data from the Israeli Labor Force Survey, the authors find that the share of immigrants in labor market cells defined by occupation, industry, district of residence, schooling, and experience was generally positively associated with natives' probability of moving from employment to non-employment. However, when the analysis controls for the endogenous sorting of immigrants across cells, this effect is substantially reduced for men, and disappears or is even reversed for women. The authors conclude that immigrants tended to cluster in labor market cells with high turnover rates and that immigration did not increase natives' likelihood of exiting employment. They also find no discernible effects of immigration on natives' transitions between labor market cells or on the probability of their moving from non-employment to employment.
Disabled Workers and Wage Losses: Some Evidence from Workers with Occupational Injuries
Authors: Campolieti Michele , Krashinsky Harry
Published: June 2015

Using data from the Survey of Ontario Workers with Permanent Impairments (1989–90), the authors examine the effects of work-related disabilities on the wage losses of disabled male workers. One important focus of the analysis is whether the size of disabled workers' wage losses was affected by whether they remained at or left the job where the accident occurred. The authors also estimate the longer-term persistence of wage shocks for disabled workers. The estimates suggest that wage losses were larger for disabled workers who did not return to work with their time-of-accident employer than for those who did return, with the latter earning 27% more. Furthermore, wages appear to have been more persistent for workers who did not return to their accident employer than for those who did return.
Is There a Glass Ceiling over Europe? Exploring the Gender Pay Gap across the Wage Distribution
Authors: Arulampalam Wiji , Booth Alison L. , Bryan Mark L.
Published: June 2015

Using harmonized data for the years 1995–2001 from the European Community Household Panel, the authors analyze gender pay gaps by sector across the wage distribution in eleven countries. In estimations that control for the effects of individual characteristics at different points of the distribution, they calculate the part of the gap attributable to differing returns between men and women. The magnitude of the gender pay gap, thus measured, varied substantially across countries and across the public and private sector wage distributions. The gap typically widened toward the top of the wage distribution (the “glass ceiling” effect), and in a few cases it also widened at the bottom (the “sticky floor” effect). The authors suggest that differences in childcare provision and wage setting institutions across EU countries may partly account for the variation in patterns by country and sector.
Trade Protection and Industry Wages in India
Authors: Dutta Puja Vasudeva
Published: June 2015

This paper examines the link between trade protection and industry wage premia in India using a unique dataset combining employment survey data with industry-level data for various years between 1983 and 2000. The author finds that India's trade reforms were not distributionally neutral. The impact of protection on industry wage premia was positive and statistically significant, though modest in magnitude: workers employed in industries with high tariffs received higher wages than apparently identical workers in low-tariff industries. Because industries with high initial levels of protection were also those with the largest tariff reductions during this period and had the highest share of unskilled workers, the positive tariff-wage effect implies that the trade reforms were likely to have increased wage inequality as the relative wages of the (predominantly unskilled) workers in these manufacturing industries fell.
Unions, Work Practices, and Wages under Different Institutional Environments: The Case of Canada and England
Authors: Godard John
Published: June 2015

Using data collected in 2003–2004 in national telephone surveys of 750 Canadian and 450 English workers, the author finds that alternative work practices (AWPs), such as autonomous teams, quality circles, and information sharing, provided meaningful pay gains for non-union workers but not union workers in both Canada and England. In Canada, non-union AWP payoffs approached union wage premia at even moderate levels of AWP adoption, suggesting that AWPs may serve as an alternative means to higher pay, one that is incompatible with unions and that could erode demand for union representation. In England, there was no meaningful union wage premium, suggesting that AWPs may have replaced pay bargaining as a means to higher pay; but an interaction term combining union representation and “best” HR practices bore a strong association with higher pay, consistent with a new economic role whereby unions achieve gains for their members through collaborative, performance-enhancing strategies.
Labor Law Reform and the Role of Delay in Union Organizing: Empirical Evidence from Canada
Authors: Campolieti Michele , Riddell Chris , Slinn Sara
Published: June 2015

This paper examines the determinants and consequences of delay in the union certification process using data from certification applications and unfair labor practice complaints (ULPs) from British Columbia (1986–98) and Ontario (1993–98). During the period studied, there were several changes in delay-related laws, including laws regulating the presence and stringency of election time limits and the availability of expedited ULP hearings. Key findings are that ULPs against the employer reduced the likelihood of compliance with time limit laws except where expedited ULP hearings also existed; employer-filed objections to the application reduced the likelihood of compliance; and election delay reduced the likelihood of certification success both in policy regimes without time limits and in those where stipulated time limits were frequently breached. Overall, the results suggest that enforced time limits on elections coupled with expedited ULP hearings may substantially mitigate the adverse effects of election delay on certification success.
Principals as Agents? Investigating Accountability in the Compensation and Performance of School Principals
Authors: Billger Sherrilyn M.
Published: June 2015

Although school accountability incentives and standards, such as district-mandated goals and state sanctions for poor performance, are increasingly common, few studies have investigated their effectiveness. The author of this paper seeks evidence on whether such policies affect public secondary principal pay and school performance. An analysis of cross-sectional variation in data from the 1999–2000 Schools and Staffing Survey indicates that accountability policies coincided with lower college matriculation rates and lower principal pay, particularly for the best principals. On the other hand, the policies were associated with higher student retention rates at the worst schools. Though principals at those schools may not have been directly rewarded through accountability policies, these principals appear to have acted as agents for students in danger of dropping out.
New Evidence on the Determinants of Absenteeism Using Linked Employer-Employee Data
Authors: Dionne Georges , Dostie Benoit
Published: June 2015

This paper provides new evidence on the determinants of absenteeism. The authors extend the typical labor-leisure model used to analyze the decision to skip work to include firm-level policy variables relevant to the absenteeism decision and uncertainty about the cost of absenteeism. Estimates based on data from Statistics Canada's Workplace Employee Survey (1999–2002), with controls for observed and unobserved demographic, job, and firm characteristics (including workplace practices), indicate that work arrangements were important determinants of absence. For example, the authors find strong evidence that standard weekday work hours, work-at-home options, and reduced workweeks were associated with reduced absence, whereas shift work and compressed work weeks were associated with increased absence.
Wage and Injury Response to Shifts in Workplace Liability
Authors: Butler Richard J. , Worrall John D.
Published: June 2015

This paper examines the impact of a monumental change in tort liability law, the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA) of 1908. This shift from common law, by changing the way injured workers were compensated and the compensating wage differentials for risk bearing, set the stage for workers' compensation and other no-fault systems. Focusing on the New Jersey railroad system, the authors examine three periods: the pre-FELA years of 1900–1908; 1909–11, when the FELA laws were the only changes in the common laws affecting some railroad workers; and 1912–16, when both FELA and workers' compensation laws affected railroad workers. They find that as liability shifted to railroad companies, accident rates fell for three occupational groups who worked outdoors, but rose for railroad “craft” employees (who worked indoors in shops). They also find that wages shifted for all four of the major occupational groups as predicted by their model.
Gender Differences in the Response to Competition
Authors: Price Joseph
Published: June 2015

To investigate whether men and women respond differently to competition and whether this response depends on the gender mix of the group, the author examines outcomes of the Mellon Foundation's Graduate Education Initiative, a competitive fellowship program instituted in 1991 that was aimed at increasing graduation rates and decreasing time to degree. Men's performance, as measured by time to candidacy, increased 10% in response to the program, with the largest gains for men in departments with the highest proportions of female students. Women did not increase performance, on average, but the response of women did differ greatly depending on the gender mix of their peers, with a more positive response when a larger fraction of the group was female. These results suggest that when devising incentive schemes, policy-makers may need to be mindful of an inherent tradeoff between increasing aggregate outcomes through the use of competition and achieving gender equity.
The Sexual Orientation Wage Gap: The Role of Occupational Sorting and Human Capital
Authors: Antecol Heather , Jong Anneke , Steinberger Michael
Published: June 2015

Using data from the 2000 U.S. Census, the authors explore two alternative explanations for the sexual orientation wage gap: occupational sorting, and human capital differences. They find that lesbian women earned more than heterosexual women irrespective of marital status, while gay men earned less than their married heterosexual counterparts but more than their cohabitating heterosexual counterparts. Results of a Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition indicate that the relative wage advantages observed for some groups of lesbians and gay men were mainly owing to greater levels of human capital accumulation (particularly education), while occupational sorting had little or no influence. The relative wage penalties that were observed in other cases, however, cannot be attributed either to differences in occupational sorting or to human capital. An analysis employing a DiNardo, Fortin, and Lemieux decomposition, which allows for variation in the wage gap at different points along the wage distribution, broadly confirms these results.
The Eyes of the Needles: A Sequential Model of Union Organizing Drives, 1999–2004
Authors: Ferguson John-Paul
Published: June 2015

This paper models three stages of the union organizing drive, using a new dataset covering more than 22,000 drives that took place between 1999 and 2004. The correlated sequential model tracks drives through all of their potential stages: holding an election, winning an election, and reaching first contracts. Only one-seventh of organizing drives that filed an election petition with the NLRB managed to reach a first contract within a year of certification. The model, which controls for the endogeneity of unfair labor practice (ULP) charges, finds that a ULP charge was associated with a 30% smaller cumulative chance of reaching such a contract. ULP charges had less effect on the votes cast than on the decision to hold an election and the ability to reach a first contract. A sequential model such as this one could be extended to test between some competing theories about the determinants of union organizing.
The Effect of Labor Market Institutions on Salaried and Self-Employed Less-Educated Men in the 1980S
Authors: Krashinsky Harry
Published: June 2015

Less-educated workers exhibited negative real wage growth from the late 1970s to the early 1990s. Frequently cited to explain this pattern are such labor market trends as union decline and the falling real value of the minimum wage, but also of concern is the possible contribution of decreased demand, caused by factors such as skill-biased technological change. To investigate the relative importance of these determinants, the author, using CPS data, compares the experiences of wage-and-salary workers with those of the self-employed. Wages apparently declined little for less-educated self-employed workers, but greatly for similar wage-and-salary workers. Because self-employed workers are affected by the same demand shocks as wage-and-salary workers but are not subject to labor market institutions such as the minimum wage or labor unions, the author concludes that the main source of the observed negative real wage growth was the decline of labor market institutions, not skill-biased technological change.
Do Financial Bonuses Reduce Employee Absenteeism? Evidence from a Lottery
Authors: Hassink Wolter H.J. , Koning Pierre
Published: June 2015

This paper investigates the effectiveness of a lottery-based bonus reward system in reducing employee absenteeism. Starting in June 2002, a Dutch manufacturing firm held a monthly lottery for workers who had taken no sick leave in the previous three months and had not previously won the lottery. In a given lottery, each of seven contestants whose names were randomly drawn received 75 Euros. The authors find statistically significant differences in absence patterns across groups of workers with different eligibility statuses depending on their attendance records and whether they had previously won. One finding is that absenteeism rose among workers who, having won already, were ineligible for further participation. Nevertheless, and although the reduction in firm-wide absence associated with the lottery drifted from 2.4 percentage points to 1.1 percentage points after seven months, the authors conclude that the lottery was of net benefit to the firm.
Who Wants and Gets Flexibility? Changing Work Hours Preferences and Life Events
Authors: Drago Robert , Wooden Mark , Black David
Published: June 2015

Using panel data for 2001–2005 from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey, the authors examine workers' desires for, and achievement of, work hour flexibility. They estimate a dynamic model that controls for preferences in previous years and tests for the effects of life events on both desired employment and desired work hours. Many life events, such as motherhood and retirement, are found to have predictable effects. Parallel regressions are estimated for actual employment and the number of hours usually worked, and the results are compared to those for preferences. The dynamics of usual hours often mirror those for preferences, suggesting that labor markets function effectively for many employees. However, mismatches are associated with three life events: motherhood, widowhood for men, and job loss. The results also suggest that many men and women would extend employment under phased retirement programs, although only for a brief period.
How Institutions and Business Strategies Affect Wages: A Cross-National Study of Call Centers
Authors: Batt Rosemary , Nohara Hiroatsu
Published: June 2015

This paper, drawing on a 2003–2006 establishment-level survey of 1,819 call centers in 15 countries, examines effects of industrial relations institutions and employer strategies on wage variation across coordinated, liberal, and emerging market economies. The authors find several contradictory patterns, which confirm theoretical predictions for some countries and contradict them for others, suggesting diverse institutional reactions to the emergence of a new economic activity. Consistent with prior research, Denmark, France, and Sweden exhibit patterns of low wage dispersion and no union wage premium, and the United States, Canada, and emerging market economies exhibit quite high levels of dispersion. Contrary to prior research, Austria and Germany resemble the United States in their levels of wage dispersion, while the United Kingdom resembles the coordinated market group. Finally, employer strategies of outsourcing and market segmentation explain within-country wage variation in most countries, suggesting considerable flexibility in wage setting at the establishment level.
Technology, Selection, and Training in Call Centers
Authors: Sieben Inge , De Grip Andries , Longen Jessica , Sørensen Ole
Published: June 2015

This analysis of establishment-level call center survey data from 14 countries in 2003–2006 explores relationships among technology, selection, and training for both newly hired and more experienced workers. The findings suggest, consistent with the more generic literature, that information and communication technology (ICT) increased training investments. However, the effects on both training and informal learning in the first year differed by technology type. Workflow automation technologies had particularly strong influence on training demands for newly hired agents in call centers. In contrast, interaction automation technologies (such as interactive voice response and speech recognition) and enhanced interaction technologies (such as media blending, electronic customer relationship management, and web-enablement) only led to more ongoing training, and interaction automation technologies had a negative relationship with informal learning in the first year. The findings also suggest that call centers with high levels of ICT recruited a work force with higher returns to training.
Still a Coordinated Model? Market Liberalization and the Transformation of Employment Relations in the German Telecommunications Industry
Authors: Doellgast Virginia
Published: June 2015

This paper examines recent changes in collective bargaining and employer strategies in the German telecommunications industry following market liberalization in the late 1990s. Germany's distinctive co-determination and vocational training institutions encouraged large firms to adopt employment systems in technician and call center workplaces that relied on high levels of worker skill and discretion. However, organizational restructuring is undermining these gains, as firms use outsourcing and the creation of subsidiaries to escape or weaken company-level collective agreements. These trends have substantially weakened unions and contributed to the further disorganization of coordinated bargaining structures. Findings are based on interviews with union and works council representatives, managers, and employees at Deutsche Telekom and its major competitors conducted between 2003 and 2007, as well as secondary analysis of company documents and industry reports.
Strategic Choices in Pluralist and Unitarist Employment Relations Regimes: A Study of Australian Telecommunications
Authors: Ross Peter , Bamber Greg J.
Published: June 2015

Using interview data collected between 1992 and 2009, the authors explore how deregulation of the Australian telecommunications sector and re-regulation of the labor market affected employment relations (ER) strategies at Telstra, Australia's former telecommunications monopoly. Labor market re-regulation reversed much of the previous institutional support for union activity, and unions struggled to adjust to this changed institutional context. Telstra's ER strategies included large-scale downsizing and outsourcing. It moved dramatically toward unitarist (anti-union) ER approaches, with a shift away from collective bargaining toward individual employment contracts. This history raises a more general question of the extent to which employers make strategic ER choices autonomously and the extent to which such choices reflect the influence of the national institutional context. The authors conclude that while the changing institutional context—in this case, primarily government regulation—facilitated Telstra's strategic choices, management ideology was an important intervening variable in determining such choices.
The Exceptional Decline of the American Labor Movement
Authors: Godard John
Published: June 2015

This paper adopts a historical/new institutionalist perspective to explain why the decline of the American labor movement has been exceptional in comparison to other labor movements, and especially its Canadian counterpart. Under this perspective, national founding conditions and traditions become embedded in institutional norms that shape national institutional environments and trajectories, substantially constraining labor movements and hence accounting for their development and future. The author argues that the founding conditions of the United States gave rise to “mobilization biases”—biases affecting the various parties' relative ability to mobilize resources, and thus ultimately privileging some interests over others—that explain both why the labor movement developed as it did and why it has declined. He concludes that, in view of these biases and the norms underpinning them, the American labor movement's future (unlike the future of its European counterparts) lies in perpetual struggle rather than the pursuit of a long-term accord.
The Long-Term Effects of Unemployment Insurance: Evidence from New Brunswick and Maine, 1940–1991
Authors: Kuhn Peter , Riddell Chris
Published: June 2015

Using data spanning half a century for adjacent jurisdictions in the United States and Canada, the authors study the long-term effects of a generous unemployment insurance (UI) program on the distribution of weeks worked. They find substantial effects. For example, in 1990, about 12.6% of working-age men in Maine's northernmost counties worked between 1 and 39 weeks; just across the border in New Brunswick, the figure was 25.6%. According to the estimates, New Brunswick's much more generous UI system accounts for more than three-fourths of this differential. In part because part-year workers are drawn from both ends of the distribution of annual weeks worked (0 weeks and 40–52 weeks), the generosity of New Brunswick's program had only modest estimated effects on total labor supply, even as it substantially increased UI program participation and expenditures.
How's the Job? Well-Being and Social Capital in the Workplace
Authors: Helliwell John F. , Huang Haifang
Published: June 2015

The authors first investigate how income and job characteristics affect life satisfaction, then estimate compensating differentials for non-financial job characteristics. To address potential problems with using life satisfaction data as dependent variables, they draw on three Canadian surveys (conducted in the years 2002–2003) with different samples and questions, and they use individual personality measures, various robustness checks, and cross-testing with measures of domain satisfaction. The life satisfaction results show strikingly large values for non-financial job characteristics, especially workplace trust. For example, a one-third-standard-deviation increase in trust in management is equivalent to an income increase of more than one-third. These results, if confirmed by further research in other settings, suggest either that it is very costly to build and maintain workplace trust or that there are opportunities to improve workplace environments so as to increase both life satisfaction and workplace efficiency.
Changes in Returns to Education in Latin America: The Role of Demand and Supply of Skills
Authors: Manacorda Marco , Sanchez-Paramo Carolina , Schady Norbert
Published: June 2015

Using micro data for the urban areas of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico, the authors document trends in men's returns to education during the 1980s and the 1990s and estimate the role of supply and demand factors in explaining the changes in skill premia. They propose a model of demand for skills with three production inputs, corresponding to workers with primary-, secondary-, and university-level education. Further, the authors demonstrate that an unprecedented rise in the supply of workers having completed secondary-level education depressed their wages relative to workers with primary-level education throughout Latin America. This supply shift was compounded by a generalized shift in the demand for workers with tertiary education.
Effort and Comparison Income: Experimental and Survey Evidence
Authors: Clark Andrew E. , Masclet David , Villeval Marie Claire
Published: June 2015

The authors test the hypothesis that individual effort on the job depends both on one's own income and on the individual's position in the relevant income distribution. Combining experimental evidence from a gift-exchange game with multi-country ISSP survey data, they analyze the extent to which relative income affects an individual's effort, finding that an individual's rank in the income distribution more strongly determines effort than does others' average income, which suggests that comparisons are more ordinal than cardinal. Their experiment also reveals that comparisons over time affect effort: individuals who received higher income offers or enjoyed higher income rank in the past exerted lower levels of effort for a given current income and rank.
Institutional Economics and the Minimum Wage: Broadening the Theoretical and Policy Debate
Authors: Kaufman Bruce E.
Published: June 2015

Debate among labor economists on the pros and cons of a minimum wage law has come to focus on whether labor markets are competitive or monopsonistic. Using principles and concepts of institutional economics, the author argues that this perspective on minimum wages is too narrow. In particular, he uses institutional theory to develop four theoretical rationales for minimum wage legislation: setting a floor on wages to offset imperfect competition and inequality of bargaining power; promote macroeconomic stabilization and full employment; contribute to long-term efficiency and growth; and incorporate labor market externalities and social costs of labor. One revisionist implication is that a minimum wage under plausible conditions may increase economic efficiency even in a purely competitive labor market.
Union Organizing in China: Still a Monolithic Labor Movement?
Authors: Liu Mingwei
Published: June 2015

In contrast to much of the research that treats the official All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) as a monolithic organization, the author argues that there is considerable variation within ACFTU in terms of local union organizing strategies. Using extensive field research and interviews with regional union officials, grassroots union cadres, shop floor workers, and employers and managers in China during the period 2005–2007, the author contributes to an understanding of contemporary trade union strategies in China. Moreover, his analysis of regional union strategies suggests three patterns of union organizing: the traditional ACFTU pattern, the union association pattern, and the regional, industry-based bargaining pattern, each with vastly different consequences for the future of trade unions and collective bargaining in China.
Female-Led Firms and Gender Wage Policies
Authors: Cardoso Ana Rute , Winter-Ebmer Rudolf
Published: June 2015

Using a longitudinal dataset covering the period 1987–2000, the authors explore the impact of female employers and gender segregation on wages in Portugal. In the context of Becker's (1957) taste for discrimination theory, they investigate whether the gender of a firm manager affects gender wage differences. They find that females benefit from higher wages in female-led firms than in male-led firms. Further, when females lead, the wage gap between female and male workers is reduced by 1.5%, regardless of the gender composition of the firm's workforce. At the same time, the higher the share of females in a firm, the lower the wages overall for both female and male workers. The authors' results are compatible with the notion that job promotion is an important factor in wage increases. The more females are mentored and promoted, the less men will be. However, as more females in the firm compete for promotion, opportunities for both females and males to be promoted diminish.
The Male Marital Wage Premium: Sorting Vs. Differential Pay
Authors: Petersen Trond , Penner Andrew M. , Høgsnes Geir
Published: June 2015

The authors examine whether male marital and parenthood premia arise due to differential pay by employers or from differential sorting of employees on occupations and establishments. They investigate these premia using matched employee-employer data from the period 1979–96 in Norway, a country with increased pressures on men to be more active in the family sphere and in which public policy has aimed at remaking the family institution. We find that the effect of marriage, and to a lesser extent of children, occurs mostly through sorting on occupations and occupation-establishment units. The role of differential pay from employers is marginal in explaining the marital and parenthood premia. Results assessing within-individual changes in wages suggest that about 80% of the marital premium is due to selection. The men who eventually marry and/or have children sort into the higher-paying occupations and occupation-establishment units even prior to marriage and parenthood.
Labor Market Rigidities and the Employment Behavior of Older Workers
Authors: Blau David , Shvydko Tetyana
Published: June 2015

It is often asserted that the labor market is characterized by rigidities that make it difficult for older workers to carry out their desired trajectory from work to retirement. One potentially important source of rigidity is the restrictions on hours of work imposed by firms, but such rigidities are difficult to measure directly. The authors explore two variables that may serve as proxies for flexibility in hours at the employer level: the shares of older workers and young women in the employer's work force. The authors use matched worker-firm data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation and the Longitudinal Employer Household Dynamics study for the period 1990–2004 to analyze the effects of these variables on the job separation propensity of workers aged 45–69. Results indicate that older workers employed in firms with greater shares of older workers and young female workers have a lower propensity for job separation. These findings provide indirect but suggestive evidence of the importance of labor market rigidities in shaping employment decisions of older workers.
Is There Really a Faculty Union Salary Premium?
Authors: Hedrick David W. , Henson Steven E. , Krieg John M. , Wassell Charles S.
Published: June 2015

Studies of the effects of unions on collegiate faculty salaries are inconclusive. Some estimate a significant union premium, but such estimates suffer from endogeneity between unions and wages, non-random measurement error, and failure to adjust for local cost-of-living differences. By using data from the National Study of Postsecondary Faculty (NSOPF, 1988–2004) as well as other sources to identify institution-specific factors omitted from previous studies, the authors estimate significantly smaller union premia than those found by other researchers.
Returns to Foreign Languages of Native Workers in the European Union
Authors: Ginsburgh Victor A. , Prieto-Rodriguez Juan
Published: June 2015

Most of the literature on returns to languages is concerned with immigrants. The authors' study, which uses the European Community Household Panel Survey for the period 1994–2001, infers returns to non-native languages by native workers in nine countries of the European Union. The study differs from other studies that deal with the same issue in three respects. First, instead of using a dummy for each language, they use the ratio of the population not proficient in a given country's national language and compare the results with the more traditional approach using dummies. Second, they correct for time-independent measurement errors in self-reporting and find that the resulting IV estimates are much larger than those obtained by OLS. They also suggest that there is little room for time-persistent errors and heterogeneity and that therefore their estimates should suffer ostensibly little from unobserved ability biases. Finally, they estimate IV quantile regressions to illustrate how returns to languages vary at different points of the distribution of earnings.
Socio-Productive Models in France: An Empirical Dynamic Overview, 1992–2004
Authors: Amosse Thomas , Coutrot Thomas
Published: June 2015

The authors assess the evolution of French workplaces over the periods 1992–1993, 1998–1999, and 2004–2005 within the framework of socio-productive organizational models. Using French employment relations survey data (REPONSE), they analyze the empirical relevance of these models in light of three dimensions: work organization, human resource management (HRM), and industrial relations. Results indicate the emergence of two “innovative” models: the “Toyotist” model, featuring just-in-time organizational methods, innovative HRM systems, high employee participation, and low union presence; and the “neo-Taylorist” model, featuring low innovation, low investment in HRM, strict managerial control with minimal employee participation, and average union presence. Data also reveal the existence of an additional model: the “public-in-transition” model, featuring a mixed HRM focus that is part individual and part collective; moreover, workplaces feature a high and varied union presence and autonomous work groups. Overall findings indicate a dual movement of socio-productive models: the development of the Toyotist model occurred mainly between 1992 and 1998 for some workplaces whereas for others, such as those aging or becoming privatized, there was a shift to the neo-Taylorist model for the period 1998–2004.
Unionization and the Evolution of the Wage Distribution in Sweden: 1968 to 2000
Authors: Albrecht James , Björklund Anders , Vroman Susan
Published: June 2015

Using the 1968, 1981, and 2000 Swedish Level of Living Surveys, the authors examine the evolution of the wage distribution in Sweden over the periods 1968–1981 and 1981–2000. The first period was the heyday of the Swedish solidarity wage policy with strong equalization clauses in the central wage agreements. During the second period, there was more flexibility for firms to adjust wages to reflect conditions such as labor shortages in particular fields. The authors find a remarkable narrowing of the wage distribution in the first period, but in the second period, wages grew more equally across the distribution. The authors decompose these changes in wages across the distribution into two components–those due to changes in the distribution of characteristics such as education and experience and those due to changes in the distribution of returns to those characteristics. They find that the wage compression between 1968 and 1981 was driven by changes in the distribution of returns, but between 1981 and 2000, the change in the distribution of returns had less of an effect on wage compression.
Employee Involvement, Technology and Evolution in Job Skills: A Task-Based Analysis
Authors: Green Francis
Published: June 2015

The author investigates the evolution of job skill distribution using task data derived from the U.K. Skills Surveys of 1997, 2001, and 2006, and the 1992 Employment Survey in Britain. He determines the extent to which employee involvement in the workplace and computer technologies promote the use of higher order cognitive and interactive skills. He finds that literacy, other communication tasks, and self-planning skills have grown especially fast. Numerical and problem-solving skills have also become more important, but repetitive physical skills have largely remained unchanged. He finds that employee involvement and computer technologies privilege the use of greater generic skills but substitute for repetitive physical tasks. However, the classification of all tasks as either routine or non-routine is found to be problematic. Finally, the author finds a strong connection between the rising use of more academic skills and the education level required for entry into the labor market.
Relative Wage Positions and Quit Behavior: Evidence from Linked Employer-Employee Data
Authors: Pfeifer Christian , Schneck Stefan
Published: June 2015

The authors analyze the importance of relative wage positions within firms in western Germany in the context of individual quit decisions as an inverse measure of job satisfaction. Using a linked employer-employee data set (LIAB) for the years 1996–2005 whose sample consists of full-time male prime-age workers in western Germany without college degrees, they ascertain whether workers find status or signal effects stronger motivators for quit decisions. They find that workers with higher relative wage positions within their firms are, on average, more likely to quit their jobs than those with lower relative wage positions and that workers who experience a loss in their relative wage positions are also more likely to accept a wage cut associated with their job transition. Overall, results suggest that a signal effect is, on average, stronger than a status effect.
The Job Satisfaction-Productivity Nexus: A Study Using Matched Survey and Register Data
Authors: Böckerman Petri , Ilmakunnas Pekka
Published: June 2015

The authors examine the role of employee job satisfaction in Finnish manufacturing plants over the period 1996–2001 to determine the extent to which it affects establishment-level productivity. Using matched data on job satisfaction from the European Community Household Panel (ECHP) and information on establishment productivity from longitudinal register data linked to the ECHP, they estimate that the effect of an increase in the establishment's average level of employee job satisfaction on productivity is positive, but its magnitude varies depending on the specification of the model. The authors use an instrumental variables point estimate and find that an increase in the measure of job satisfaction by one within-plant standard deviation increases value-added per hours worked in manufacturing by 6.6%.
The Willingness to Pay for Job Amenities: Evidence from Mothers' Return to Work
Authors: Felfe Christina
Published: June 2015

The author examines the extent to which mothers are willing to trade wages for non-wage job attributes within the context of maternity leave. The key aspect of this framework is that mothers can decide whether and when to return to their guaranteed job. In contrast to previous studies that analyze the job search of employed workers, in this framework one does not need to observe the wage/amenity offer process. It is the first study of its kind to estimate mothers' marginal willingness to pay (MWP) for job amenities directly. The author derives the MWP for job amenities from duration data and uses data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and the Qualification and Career Survey to estimate mothers' leave-length decisions by a discrete duration method. The MWP for amenities is inferred through the estimated response of the leave length with respect to the amenities and the wage. Results indicate that mothers are willing to sacrifice a significant fraction of their wage to reduce hazards and to enjoy a flexible work schedule.
Wage Theory, New Deal Labor Policy, and the Great Depression: Were Government and Unions to Blame?
Authors: Kaufman Bruce E.
Published: June 2015

A growing number of economists blame the length and severity of the Great Depression on factors that rigidified wage rates, raised production costs, and interfered with the market allocation of labor. The target of their critique is President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal labor program, which they portray as creating a series of large negative supply shocks through encouragement of unions, minimum wages, unemployment insurance, and other anticompetitive industrial relations practices. The author uses a combination of institutiognal and Keynesian theory to present the other side of the story. Drawing principally from the works of J. R. Commons and J. M. Keynes, he develops both a spending and a productivity rationale for stable wages during the Great Depression and demonstrates that the New Deal's interventionist labor program was on balance necessary and beneficial. He also highlights the neglected macro-economic dimension of industrial relations theory and policy.
The Effect of Protection of Temporary Workers on Employment Levels: Evidence from the 2007 Reform of South Korea
Authors: Yoo Gyeongjoon , Kang Changhui
Published: June 2015

The authors investigate the effects of recent South Korean labor reform, which was designed to protect temporary workers, on the level of temporary, permanent, and overall employment in that country. Because the effects of employment protection legislation (EPL) on employment levels remain theoretically ambiguous, they must be determined by empirical analysis. The impacts of the reform on both temporary and overall employment are negative at first and fade away in two years after the reform, hence taking a U-shape in the post-reform period. The impact of the reform on permanent employment is, however, positive two years after the reform. At least in the short run, an increase in protection for workers comes at a cost of reduced levels of employment.
The Diffusion of HR Practices in Chinese Workplaces and Organizational Outcomes
Authors: Gahan Peter , Michelotti Marco , Standing Guy
Published: June 2015

How relevant are human resource (HR) practices in economies undergoing significant economic transition from a command to a market-based system? Using data drawn from a large sample of Chinese establishments, the authors investigate the spread of a range of Western-style HR practices in China and estimate the relationship between the adoption of these practices and three organizational outcomes: sales per employee, total labor costs, and unit labor costs. They find a mixed result for the relationships between labor management practices and establishment productivity. While the introduction of a number of HR practices was also associated with significantly higher labor costs, the results indicate a more mixed result for the relationship between these practices and unit labor costs. Their findings further the understanding of the relationship between work practices and organizational outcomes, and they help clarify the effects of the changing economic context on HR management in China.
Labor Unions, Alternative Forms of Representation, and the Exercise of Authority Relations in U.S. Workplaces
Authors: Godard John , Frege Carola
Published: June 2015

The authors draw on a telephone survey of 1,000 U.S. workers to explore whether alternative, nonunion forms of representation are filling the gap left by union decline; whether this matters to authority relations at work; and whether these first two points help to explain union decline. The authors find that nonunion associations do not appear to be filling the gap, but that management established, nonunion representation systems are one-and-a-half times as widespread as is union representation and are evaluated somewhat more favorably by workers. Both unions and management-established systems bear positive associations with authority relations at work before controlling for management practices, but these are substantially weakened once management practices—especially “bureaucratic” practices—are entered. The authors argue that, in the case of unions, this is likely because unions cause employers to adopt these practices. This is not likely to be the case of management-established systems, however, which are more likely to be set up in conjunction with these practices. Finally, results suggest that management-established systems are often in violation of the Wagner Act, but they bear no association with the propensity to vote for a union. Instead, bureaucratic practices matter, independently of these systems.
Why are So Few Females Promoted into CEO and Vice President Positions? Danish Empirical Evidence, 1997–2007
Authors: Smith Nina , Smith Valdemar , Verner Mette
Published: June 2015

The authors estimate the probability of promotion into VP and CEO positions using employer-employee data from all Danish companies observed during the period 1997 to 2007. After controlling for a large number of firm and family-related variables, including take-up history of maternity and paternity leave and proxies for female-friendly companies, a considerable gap still occurs in the promotion probabilities for CEO positions. Part of the gap is due to gender differences in the area of specialization as top executive. Women tend to cluster in VP positions in HR, R&D, and IT areas in which the chances of a CEO promotion are lower than for positions as CFOs and VPs in Sales or Production areas.