Description
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- Cover
- Reference Tables
- Half Title
- Title
- Copyright
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- The Labor Market
- Labor Economics: Some Basic Concepts
- Positive Economics
- The Models and Predictions of Positive Economics
- EXAMPLE 1.1 Positive Economics: What Does It Mean to “Understand” Behavior?
- Normative Economics
- EXAMPLE 1.2 Do We Need “Nudges” to Make the Right Decisions for Ourselves?
- Normative Economics and Government Policy
- Efficiency Versus Equity
- Plan of the Text
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 1A
- Statistical Testing of Labor Market Hypotheses
- A Univariate Test
- Multiple Regression Analysis
- The Problem of Omitted Variables
- Notes
- 2 Overview of the Labor Market
- The Labor Market: Definitions, Facts, and Trends
- The Labor Force and Unemployment
- EXAMPLE 2.1 The Unemployment Consequences of the Sudden COVID-19 Lockdown in March 2020
- Industries and Occupations: Adapting to Change
- The Earnings of Labor
- EXAMPLE 2.2 Real Wages Across Countries and Time: Big Macs per Hour Worked
- How the Labor Market Works
- The Demand for Labor
- The Supply of Labor
- The Determination of the Wage
- EXAMPLE 2.3 The Black Death and the Wages of Labor
- EXAMPLE 2.4 Prosecuting Workers Who Leave Their Employers
- Applications of the Theory
- Who Is Underpaid and Who Is Overpaid?
- Unemployment and Responses to Technological Change Across Countries
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 2.1 PAY LEVELS AND THE SUPPLY OF MILITARY OFFICERS: OBTAINING SAMPLE VARIATION FROM CROSS-SECTION DATA
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 3 The Demand for Labor
- Profit Maximization
- Marginal Income From an Additional Unit of Input
- EXAMPLE 3.1 The Marginal Revenue Product of College Football Stars
- Marginal Expense of an Added Input
- The Short-Run Demand for Labor When Both Product and Labor Markets Are Competitive
- A Critical Assumption: Declining MPL
- From Profit Maximization to Labor Demand
- The Demand for Labor in Competitive Markets When Other Inputs Vary
- Labor Demand in the Long Run
- EXAMPLE 3.2 Coal Mining Wages and Capital Substitution
- More Than Two Inputs
- Labor Demand When the Product Market Is Not Competitive
- Maximizing Monopoly Profits
- Do Monopolies Pay Higher Wages?
- Policy Application: The Labor Market Effects of Employer Payroll Taxes and Wage Subsidies
- Who Bears the Burden of a Payroll Tax?
- Employment Subsidies as a Device to Help Unemployed People
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 3.1 DO WOMEN PAY FOR EMPLOYER-FUNDED MATERNITY BENEFITS? USING CROSS-SECTION DATA OVER TIME TO ANALYZE “DIFFERENCES IN DIFFERENCES”
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 3A Graphical Derivation of a Firm’s Labor Demand Curve
- The Production Function
- Demand for Labor in the Short Run
- Demand for Labor in the Long Run
- Conditions for Cost Minimization
- The Substitution Effect
- The Scale Effect
- Notes
- 4 Labor Demand Elasticities
- The Own-Wage Elasticity of Demand
- The Hicks–Marshall Laws of Derived Demand
- Estimates of Own-Wage Labor Demand Elasticities
- Applying the Laws of Derived Demand: Inferential Analysis
- EXAMPLE 4.1 Why Are Union Wages So Different in Two Parts of the Trucking Industry?
- The Cross-Wage Elasticity of Demand
- Can the Laws of Derived Demand Be Applied to Cross-Elasticities?
- Estimates Relating to Cross-Elasticities
- Policy Application: Effects of Minimum-Wage Laws
- History and Description
- Employment Effects: Theoretical Analysis
- Employment Effects: Empirical Estimates
- EXAMPLE 4.2 The Employment Effects of the First U.S. Federal Minimum Wage
- Does the Minimum Wage Fight Poverty?
- “Living Wage” Laws
- Applying Concepts of Labor Demand Elasticity to the Issue of Technological Change
- EXAMPLE 4.3 Do Robots and Online Hiring Platforms Create or Destroy Jobs?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 4.1 ESTIMATING THE LABOR DEMAND CURVE: TIME SERIES DATA AND COPING WITH “SIMULTANEITY”
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 5 Frictions in the Labor Market
- Frictions on the Employee Side of the Market
- The Law of One Price
- Monopsonistic Labor Markets: A Definition
- Profit Maximization Under Monopsonistic Conditions
- EXAMPLE 5.1 Monopsony Power in Labor Markets: The Case of Antitrust in the High-Tech Industry
- How Do Monopsonistic Firms Respond to Shifts in the Supply Curve?
- Monopsonistic Conditions and the Employment Response to Minimum-Wage Legislation
- Job-Search Costs and Other Labor Market Outcomes
- Monopsonistic Conditions and the Relevance of the Competitive Model
- Frictions on the Employer Side of the Market
- Categories of Quasi-fixed Costs
- EXAMPLE 5.2 Does Employment-Protection Legislation Protect Workers?
- The Employment/Hours Trade-Off
- EXAMPLE 5.3 “Renting” Workers as a Way of Coping With Hiring Costs
- Training Investments
- The Training Decision of Employers
- The Types of Training
- EXAMPLE 5.4 General Training and Training Contracts
- Training and Post-Training Wage Increases
- Employer Training Investments and Recessionary Layoffs
- Hiring Investments
- The Use of Credentials
- Internal Labor Markets
- How Can the Employer Recoup Its Hiring Investments?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 5.1 WHAT EXPLAINS WAGE DIFFERENCES FOR WORKERS WHO APPEAR SIMILAR? USING PANEL DATA TO DEAL WITH UNOBSERVED HETEROGENEITY
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 6 Supply of Labor to the Economy: The Decision to Work
- Trends in Labor Force Participation and Hours of Work
- Labor Force Participation Rates
- Hours of Work
- EXAMPLE 6.1 Gig Work and the Choice of Working Hours
- A Theory of the Decision to Work
- Some Basic Concepts
- Analysis of the Labor/Leisure Choice
- EXAMPLE 6.2 The Labor Supply of New York City Taxi Drivers
- EXAMPLE 6.3 Do Large Inheritances Induce Labor Force Withdrawal?
- Empirical Findings on the Income and Substitution Effects
- EXAMPLE 6.4 Daily Labor Supply at the Ballpark
- EXAMPLE 6.5 Labor Supply Effects of Income Tax Cuts
- Policy Applications
- Budget Constraints With “Spikes”
- EXAMPLE 6.6 Staying Around One’s Kentucky Home: Workers’ Compensation Benefits and the Return to Work
- Programs With Net Wage Rates of Zero
- Subsidy Programs With Positive Net Wage Rates
- EXAMPLE 6.7 Wartime Food Requisitions and Agricultural Work Incentives
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 6.1 ESTIMATING THE INCOME EFFECT AMONG LOTTERY WINNERS: THE SEARCH FOR “EXOGENEITY”
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 7 Labor Supply Household Production, the Family, and the Life Cycle
- A Labor Supply Model That Incorporates Household Production
- The Basic Model for an Individual: Similarities With the Labor-Leisure Model
- The Basic Model for an Individual: Some New Implications
- EXAMPLE 7.1 Obesity and the Household Production Model
- Joint Labor Supply Decisions in the Household
- Specialization of Function
- Do Both Partners Work for Pay?
- The Joint Decision and Interdependent Productivity at Home
- Labor Supply in Recessions: The “Discouraged” Versus the “Added” Worker
- EXAMPLE 7.2 Child Labor in Poor Countries
- Life Cycle Aspects of Labor Supply
- The Substitution Effect and When to Work Over a Lifetime
- EXAMPLE 7.3 How Does Labor Supply Respond to Housing Subsidies?
- The Choice of Retirement Age
- EXAMPLE 7.4 Inducing Earlier Retirement in the 1930s
- Policy Application: Childcare and Labor Supply
- Childcare Subsidies
- Child Support Assurance
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 7.1 THE EFFECTS OF WAGE INCREASES ON LABOR SUPPLY (AND SLEEP): TIME-USE DIARY DATA AND SAMPLE SELECTION BIAS
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 8 Compensating Wage Differentials and Labor Markets
- Job Matching: The Role of Worker Preferences and Information
- Individual Choice and Its Outcomes
- Assumptions and Predictions
- Empirical Tests for Compensating Wage Differentials
- EXAMPLE 8.1 Working on the Railroad: Making a Bad Job Good
- Hedonic Wage Theory and the Risk of Injury
- Employee Considerations
- Employer Considerations
- The Matching of Employers and Employees
- EXAMPLE 8.2 Parenthood, Occupational Choice, and Risk
- EXAMPLE 8.3 Indentured Servitude and Compensating Differentials
- Normative Analysis: Occupational Safety and Health Regulation
- Hedonic Wage Theory and Employee Benefits
- Employee Preferences
- Employer Preferences
- The Joint Determination of Wages and Benefits
- Policy EXAMPLE: Employer-Provided Healthcare Benefits
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 8.1 HOW RISKY ARE ESTIMATES OF COMPENSATING WAGE DIFFERENTIALS FOR RISK? THE “ERRORS IN VARIABLES” PROBLEM
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 8A Compensating Wage Differentials and Layoffs
- Unconstrained Choice of Work Hours
- Constrained Hours of Work
- The Effects of Uncertain Layoffs
- The Observed Wage–Layoff Relationship
- Notes
- 9 Investments in Human Capital Education and Training
- EXAMPLE 9.1 War and Human Capital
- Human Capital Investments: The Basic Model
- The Concept of Present Value
- Modeling the Human Capital Investment Decision
- The Demand for a College Education
- Weighing the Costs and Benefits of College
- Predictions of the Theory
- EXAMPLE 9.2 Can Language Affect Investment Behavior?
- EXAMPLE 9.3 Did the G.I. Bill Increase Educational Attainment for Returning World War II Veterans?
- EXAMPLE 9.4 When Investments in Human Capital Are Less Risky Than Investments in Physical Assets
- Market Responses to Changes in College Attendance
- Education, Earnings, and Post-Schooling Investments in Human Capital
- Average Earnings and Educational Level
- On-the-Job Training and the Concavity of Age–Earnings Profiles
- The Fanning Out of Age–Earnings Profiles
- Women and the Acquisition of Human Capital
- Is Education a Good Investment?
- Is Education a Good Investment for Individuals?
- EXAMPLE 9.5 Valuing a Human Asset: The Case of the Divorcing Doctor
- Is Education a Good Social Investment?
- EXAMPLE 9.6 The Socially Optimal Level of Educational Investment
- Is Public Sector Training a Good Social Investment?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 9.1 ESTIMATING THE RETURNS TO EDUCATION BY USING A SAMPLE OF TWINS: COPING WITH THE PROBLEM OF UNOBSERVED DIFFERENCES IN ABILITY
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 9A A “Cobweb” Model of Labor Market Adjustment
- An Example of “Cobweb” Adjustments
- Adaptive Expectations
- Rational Expectations
- Notes
- 10 Worker Mobility: Migration, Immigration, and Turnover
- The Determinants of Worker Mobility
- Geographic Mobility
- The Direction of Migratory Flows
- EXAMPLE 10.1 The Great Migration: U.S. Southern Black People Move North
- Personal Characteristics of Migrants
- The Role of Distance
- The Earnings Distribution in Sending Countries and International Migration
- EXAMPLE 10.2 Migration and One’s Time Horizon
- The Returns to International and Domestic Migration
- Policy Application: Restricting Immigration
- U.S. Immigration History
- Naive Views of Immigration
- An Analysis of the Gainers and Losers
- Do the Overall Gains From Immigration Exceed the Losses?
- EXAMPLE 10.3 Illegal Immigrants, Personal Discount Rates, and Crime
- EXAMPLE 10.4 Immigrants and Labor Mobility in the United States
- Employee Turnover
- Age Effects
- Wage Effects
- Effects of Employer Size
- Cyclical Effects
- Employer Location
- Is More Mobility Better?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 10.1 DO POLITICAL REFUGEES INVEST MORE IN HUMAN CAPITAL THAN ECONOMIC IMMIGRANTS DO? THE USE OF SYNTHETIC COHORTS
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 11 Pay and Productivity Wage Determination Within the Firm
- EXAMPLE 11.1 The Wide Range of Possible Productivities: The Case of the Factory that Could Not Cut Output
- Motivating Workers: An Overview of the Fundamentals
- The Employment Contract
- Coping With Information Asymmetries
- Motivating Workers
- EXAMPLE 11.2 Calorie Consumption and Type of Pay
- Motivating the Individual in a Group
- EXAMPLE 11.3 The Effects of Low Relative Pay on Worker Satisfaction
- Compensation Plans: Overview and Guide to the Rest of the Chapter
- Productivity and the Basis of Yearly Pay
- Employee Preferences
- Employer Considerations
- EXAMPLE 11.4 Poor Group Incentives Doom the Shakers
- Productivity and the Level of Pay
- Why Higher Pay Might Increase Worker Productivity
- Efficiency Wages
- EXAMPLE 11.5 Did Henry Ford Pay Efficiency Wages?
- Productivity and the Sequencing of Pay
- Underpayment Followed by Overpayment
- Promotion Tournaments
- EXAMPLE 11.6 The “Rat Race” in Law Firms
- Career Concerns and Productivity
- Applications of the Theory: Explaining Two Puzzles
- Why Do Earnings Increase With Job Tenure?
- Why Do Large Firms Pay More?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 11.1 ARE WORKERS WILLING TO PAY FOR FAIRNESS? USING LABORATORY EXPERIMENTS TO STUDY ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 12 Gender, Race, and Ethnicity in the Labor Market
- Measured and Unmeasured Sources of Earnings Differences
- Earnings Differences by Gender
- EXAMPLE 12.1 Bias in the Selection of Musicians by Symphony Orchestras
- EXAMPLE 12.2 Does Gig Work Eliminate the Gender Pay Gap?
- Earnings Differences Between Black Americans and White Americans
- EXAMPLE 12.3 Race Discrimination Might “Strike” When Few Are Looking: The Case of Umpires in Major League Baseball
- Earnings Differences by Ethnicity
- Theories of Market Discrimination
- Personal-Prejudice Models: Employer Discrimination
- Personal-Prejudice Models: Customer Discrimination
- Personal-Prejudice Models: Employee Discrimination
- EXAMPLE 12.4 Fear and Lathing in the Michigan Furniture Industry
- Statistical Discrimination
- EXAMPLE 12.5 “Ban the Box” and Statistical Discrimination
- Noncompetitive Models of Discrimination
- A Final Word on the Theories of Discrimination
- Federal Programs to End Discrimination
- Equal Pay Act of 1963
- Title VII of the Civil Rights Act
- EXAMPLE 12.6 Comparable Worth and the University
- The Federal Contract Compliance Program
- Effectiveness of Federal Antidiscrimination Programs
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 12.1 CAN WE CATCH DISCRIMINATORS IN THE ACT? THE USE OF FIELD EXPERIMENTS IN IDENTIFYING LABOR MARKET DISCRIMINATION
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 12A Estimating Comparable-Worth Earnings Gaps: An Application of Regression Analysis
- APPENDIX 12B Estimating the Gender Pay Gap in a Large International Company
- Notes
- 13 Unions and the Labor Market
- Union Structure and Membership
- International Comparisons of Unionism
- The Legal Structure of Unions in the United States
- Constraints on the Achievement of Union Objectives
- EXAMPLE 13.1 A Downward-Sloping Demand Curve for Football Players
- The Monopoly-Union Model
- The Efficient-Contracts Model
- The Activities and Tools of Collective Bargaining
- Union Membership: An Analysis of Demand and Supply
- EXAMPLE 13.2 The Effects of Deregulation on Trucking and Airlines
- Union Actions to Alter the Labor Demand Curve
- Bargaining and the Threat of Strikes
- EXAMPLE 13.3 Permanent Replacement of Strikers
- Bargaining in the Public Sector: The Threat of Arbitration
- The Effects of Unions
- The Theory of Union Wage Effects
- Evidence of Union Wage Effects
- Evidence of Union Total Compensation Effects
- The Effects of Unions on Employment
- The Effects of Unions on Productivity and Profits
- Normative Analyses of Unions
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 13.1 WHAT IS THE GAP BETWEEN UNION PAY AND NONUNION PAY? THE IMPORTANCE OF REPLICATION IN PRODUCING CREDIBLE ESTIMATES
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 13A Arbitration and the Bargaining Contract Zone
- Notes
- 14 Unemployment
- A Stock-Flow Model of the Labor Market
- Duration of Unemployment
- Paths to Unemployment
- Rates of Flow Affect Unemployment Levels
- Frictional Unemployment
- The Theory of Job Search
- EXAMPLE 14.1 How Discerning Should Unemployed People Be in the Search for Work?
- Effects of Unemployment Insurance Benefits
- Structural Unemployment
- Occupational and Regional Unemployment Rate Differences
- EXAMPLE 14.2 Structural Unemployment as a Threat to Social Well-Being
- International Differences in Long-Term Unemployment
- Whether Efficiency Wages Cause Structural Unemployment
- Demand-Deficient (Cyclical) Unemployment
- Downward Wage Rigidity
- EXAMPLE 14.3 Nominal Wage Cuts for Construction Workers in the Great Recession
- EXAMPLE 14.4 Recessions and Worker Effort
- Financing U.S. Unemployment Compensation
- Seasonal Unemployment
- EXAMPLE 14.5 Unemployment Insurance and Seasonal Unemployment: A Historical Perspective
- When Do We Have Full Employment?
- Defining the Natural Rate of Unemployment
- Unemployment and Demographic Characteristics
- What Is the Natural Rate?
- Empirical Study 14.1 Do Re-employment Bonuses Reduce Unemployment? The Results of Social Experiments
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- 15 Inequality in Earnings
- Measuring Inequality
- Earnings Inequality Since 1980: Some Descriptive Data
- EXAMPLE 15.1 Differences in Earnings Inequality Across Developed Countries
- The Increased Returns of Higher Education
- EXAMPLE 15.2 Changes in the Premium to Education at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century
- Growth of Earnings Dispersion in Human-Capital Groups
- The Underlying Causes of Growing Inequality
- Changes in Supply
- Changes in Demand: Technological Change
- EXAMPLE 15.3 Will Machine Learning Increase Earnings Inequality?
- EXAMPLE 15.4 Are Early Childhood Programs a Vehicle for Reducing Earnings Inequality?
- Changes in Institutional Forces
- Is Inequality Inherited?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 15.1 DO PARENTS’ EARNINGS DETERMINE THE EARNINGS OF THEIR CHILDREN? THE USE OF INTERGENERATIONAL DATA IN STUDYING ECONOMIC MOBILITY
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- APPENDIX 15A Lorenz Curves and Gini Coefficients
- Notes
- 16 The Labor Market Effects of International Trade and Production Sharing
- Why Does Trade Take Place?
- Trade Between Individuals and the Principle of Comparative Advantage
- The Incentives for Trade Across Different Countries
- EXAMPLE 16.1 The Growth Effects of the Openness to Trade: Japan’s Sudden Move to Openness in 1859
- Effects of Trade on the Demand for Labor
- Product Demand Shifts
- Shifts in the Supply of Alternative Factors of Production
- The Net Effect on Labor Demand
- EXAMPLE 16.2 Could a Quarter of U.S. Jobs Be Offshored? Might Your Future Job Be Among Them?
- Will Wages Converge Across Countries?
- Policy Issues
- Subsidizing Human-Capital Investments
- Income Support Programs
- Subsidized Employment
- How Narrowly Should We Target Compensation?
- EMPIRICAL STUDY 16.1 EVALUATING EUROPEAN ACTIVE LABOR MARKET POLICIES: THE USE OF META-ANALYSIS
- Summary
- Review Questions
- Problems
- Notes
- Selected Readings
- Answers to Odd-Numbered Review Questions and Problems
- Index