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Alabama's forest products industry plays a dominant role in the state's rural economy. Examination of how access to employment opportunities is distributed provides insight into how the benefits of this industry are distributed. Based on a combination of available secondary data and semi-structured interviews with management and workers in the pulp and paper sector of Alabama's forest products industry, a clear picture of segmented labor markets emerges in which structural and cultural factors determine access to certain jobs. The evolution of these highly segmented labor markets is traced from deep roots in racial discrimination to contemporary efforts in support of affirmative anion. Increased use of sub-contracting in logging, hauling, and mill work represents the must recent change affecting the structure of labor markets associated with the production of pulp and paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes a life‐course measure of the legal pattern that accounts for the overall legal pattern over the lifetime of migration and explores the two main pathways to labour market outcomes: selecting into legal patterns associated with different levels of labour market outcomes and realising different labour market outcomes within each pattern. Results suggest that labour market outcomes depend on which legal patterns migrants end up with instead of what they realise within each pattern. Particularly, migrants with more human capital and better social capital select into legal patterns associated with better labour market outcomes, but they do not realise better labour market outcomes given the legal patterns they experienced. From the dynamic perspective, the economic integration of migrants depends on legal patterns. Migrants in legal patterns that initiate with temporary resident status experience economic integration over time. The growth rate is larger for the patterns that involve a transition in legal status. This paper makes important contributions to the literature. First, it identifies holistic legal patterns that account for the legal status over migrants' entire migration history. Second, it sheds light on the selection into different legal patterns and highlights selection as the major process in explaining migrants' labour market outcomes. Third, it shows how legal patterns, jointly shaped by initial legal status and legal transition, determine migrants' economic integration. Finally, the inclusion of temporary resident status, beyond the illegal–legal dichotomy, enriches our understanding of how liminal legality over the lifetime of migration shapes labour market outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The logic of the 'smile curve' in the context of global value chains (GVCs) has been widely used in case studies of individual firms, but rarely identified at the country‐industry level by using real data. This paper puts forward a proposal, based on an inter‐country input–output model, to consistently measure both the gain of value added and the position of countries and industries when they join GVCs. This allows for better identification and mapping of economy‐wide smile curves in a given conceptual value chain. Using the World Input‐Output Tables, we identify the Information and Communications Technology exports‐related smile curves for China and the United States (US), which provide an intuitive and visual representation of who gains value added and jobs through joining GVCs, and to what extent. Further insight into the distributional implications of GVC expansion, based on our analysis of labour markets for China and the US, provides a strong support for the so‐called 'Paradoxical Pair of Concerns' between developed and developing countries. Our empirical results show that gains through joining GVCs may vary greatly across different skill levels of labour domestically, a fact that has, at least in part, been a driver of the backlash against globalization and the rise of trade protectionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the potential long‐run effects of large‐scale unemployment during the COVID‐19 crisis in the labour market on vulnerable job losers and labour market entrants in the United States. The paper begins by contrasting measures of the scale of job loss during the crisis. These measures are paired with estimates from past recessions indicating that the costs of job loss and unemployment can reduce workers' earnings and raise their mortality for several decades. Focusing only on a subset of vulnerable job losers, the potential lifetime earnings losses from job loss related to the COVID‐19 pandemic are predicted to be up to $2 trillion. Related losses in employment could imply a lasting reduction in the overall employment–population ratio. For these workers, losses in potential life years could be up to 24 million. Even at the low range, the resulting estimates are substantially larger than losses in potential life years from deaths directly due to COVID‐19. New labour market entrants are at risk to suffer long‐term losses in earnings and mortality as well. Based partly on experiences in other countries, the paper discusses potential reforms to short‐time compensation programmes and unemployment insurance, which could help limit the short‐ and long‐term harm from layoffs going forward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been a recent surge in papers estimating local multiplier effects. However, existing studies rely on arbitrary periods of observation, limit samples to more populous regions, and commonly use relatively aggregated industrial categories. When we address these and other methodological issues, we find that, in the United States, each new traded sector job adds half a nontraded job to a local economy, and that the addition of each high‐tech job adds less than one job to the local nontraded sector. Furthermore, we find that the multiplier effect of the manufacturing sector is no higher than the multiplier effect of the average traded sector. We provide robust evidence that higher‐paying traded sectors yield more nontraded jobs than lower paying sectors, and that multiplier effects are higher in larger cities. Furthermore, we generate IV estimates that remedy weak instrument problems in the existing multipliers literature. These findings offer needed clarity on the likely employment impacts of incentive policies aimed at attracting industries in the traded sector of the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the United States, truck rates for perishable food, the per‐mile rate charged for trucking services to move perishable food from farms to stores, rose substantially in the post‐COVID‐19 pandemic era. We argue that rising truck rates is a signal of a broader shortage of truckers, but the connection between labor shortages, rising truck rates, and a lack of trucking services has yet to be established empirically. In this paper, we develop an empirical examination based on an equilibrium job search, matching, and bargaining framework in which we estimate the role of labor shortages in accelerating driver‐wage growth, and truck rates for agricultural products. We estimate the model by combining US Bureau of Census Current Population Survey data on truck driver wages with USDA‐Agricultural Marketing Service Service data on truck rates to establish the linkage between trucker supply and the demand for trucking services. We find that the COVID‐19 pandemic was responsible for a rise in for‐hire trucker wages of some 38%$38\%$, a rise in average truck rates of nearly 50%$50\%$ and that the gap between trucker‐job openings and successful matches explains a significant, but small, rise in truck rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Papers in Regional Science is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A large body of evidence documents the educational and labour market returns to birth weight, which are reflected in investments in large social safety net programmes targeting birth weight and early life health. However, there is no direct evidence on the private valuation of birth weight. In this paper, we estimate the willingness to pay for birth weight in the United States, using a series of discrete choice experiments. Within the normal birth weight range (2,500–4,000 g), we find that individuals are, on average, willing to pay $1.47 (95% CI: [$1.24, $1.70]) for each additional gram of birth weight when the value of birth weight is estimated linearly, or $2.40 (95% CI: [$2.03, $2.77]) when the value of birth weight is estimated non‐parametrically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding science allows students with and without developmental and behavioral‐based (DB) disabilities to better appreciate the world around them as well as prepare them for the growing science‐related job market. However, students in the United States consistently underperform on science achievement tests compared to students from other nations. This underperformance could be attributed, in part to science having many specialized vocabulary terms that are not often taught explicitly, leaving students with incomplete or inaccurate understandings of word meanings. Improving science vocabulary instructional practices may support students with and without DB disabilities in enhancing their science achievement. To address this need, researchers implemented multicomponent multimedia professional development (PD) to support middle‐school science teachers in delivering high‐quality vocabulary instruction in inclusive settings. In this paper, data collected from a study evaluating the efficacy of the PD were analyzed to determine the influence on student outcomes using ANOVA and multilevel modeling methodologies. Though initial results indicate a promising impact on teacher instructional practices, little is known whether teacher participation in the PD affected student science vocabulary and content knowledge growth. Using multilevel modeling, student science knowledge growth was evaluated following their teachers' exposure to the PD. The findings from this study indicate having indirect exposure to PD had a positive effect on science content knowledge for students with and without DB disabilities (N = 980). In addition, the authors found students with DB disabilities whose teachers had access to PD showed a larger gain in science knowledge than general education students whose teachers did not have access to the PD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates whether different labour market characteristics amplify or dampen the local labour market impacts from Chinese import competition exposure. I exploit state‐level variation in initial, pre‐shock labour market characteristics and regional variation across local labour markets in exposure to Chinese imports for identification. I find that local labour markets in states with higher union density experience more severe adverse consequences as a result of increased import exposure. Conversely, higher initial minimum wages help mute the negative impacts of the China shock. I also provide some evidence that exceptions to employment‐at‐will legislation can affect employment responses to increased Chinese imports. Finally, examining all policies together in an index, I show that higher levels of policies intended to benefit and protect workers can actually magnify the extent of the damage inflicted by import competition. My results suggest that initial labour market characteristics and policies can play an important role in understanding why local labour markets react differently to trade shocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Service offshoring raises the fear of job loss for high‐skilled workers, unlike goods offshoring, because workers at home compete with highly educated workers in low‐income countries. This paper examines whether the increase in the United States's service offshoring to India has reduced the domestic employment of the occupations with greater exposure to Indian service imports. To account for endogeneity, I instrument for the growth of the United States's service imports from India by exploiting the change in Indian exports to European countries. Service offshoring reduces total employment from 2000 to 2006; however, this effect disappears overall and becomes positive for college‐educated workers in the later period from 2006 to 2016. Unlike goods offshoring, the employment effect is largely driven by college‐educated workers, and the employment growth in the later period is larger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper establishes robust dynamic features of the worker reallocation process in the US labor market. I use structural VARs with sign restrictions, which take the form of restricting the short-run negative relationship between vacancies and unemployment (i.e., Beveridge curve). Despite the 'weakness' of these restrictions, they reveal a clear, unambiguous pattern that, when unemployment increases and vacancies drop, (i) both the separation rate and gross separations rise quickly and remain persistently high, (ii) the job finding rate and vacancies drop in a hump-shaped manner, and (iii) gross hires respond little initially, but eventually rise. These results point to the importance of job loss in understanding US labor market dynamics. This pattern also holds with respect to different kinds of shocks that induce the same Beveridge curve relationship. This paper also considers the 'disaggregate model', which uses data disaggregated into six demographic groups and incorporates transitions into and out of the labor force. I show that the separation rate continues to play a dominant role among prime-age male workers, while, for other groups, changes in the job finding rate are more important. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT: This paper will set up a general equilibrium model with a distorted labour market to explore the effects of an environmental tax and union bargaining power on formal employment and the informal competitive wage. We find that when the government raises the environmental tax, both formal employment and informal competitive wage would fall. In addition, we confirm that a policy of labour market reform would increase both formal employment and the informal competitive wage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies have found evidence of a local employment multiplier's effect. For the most part, these studies provide an average estimate for all labor markets. In this paper, we examine how the average local employment multiplier, the effect of an exogenous increase in employment in the tradable sector on total employment, depends on the characteristics of the local labor market. Specifically, we estimate the average multipliers for coastal, noncoastal, large, and small metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) across different time periods using the data of 333 US MSAs. Overall, we find a reduced form of local employment multiplier ranging from 1.38 to 2.24, which is within the range of typically estimated local employment multipliers. In addition, the characteristics of the local labor market matter. The local multipliers appear larger in noncoastal and large MSAs. For small and coastal metros, the multiplier is closer to 1.5 than to 2.0 while in the case of large and noncoastal metros, it is closer to 2.0 than to 1.5. The local multipliers are also sensitive to the time period considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines two labour market outcomes experienced by users of federally-funded transportation services for low-wage workers in the United States, using primary data from 23 locations. The propensity of users to be unemployed prior to using the service is found to be related to the type of service (fixed-route/demand-response) and location type (urban/rural) but not to aggregate local unemployment, variability in local unemployment rates or local welfare policies. The propensity to earn higher wages is related to the type of employment transportation service and location, and local unemployment levels. Results imply a need for locally-derived, coordinated employment transportation plans. Resumen Este artículo examina dos consecuencias del mercado laboral sufridas por los usuarios de servicios de transporte subvencionados por el gobierno federal para trabajadores de bajos ingresos en los Estados Unidos, haciendo uso de datos primarios de 23 localizaciones. Se ha encontrado que la propensión de los usuarios a estar desempleados antes de utilizar el servicio está relacionada con el tipo de servicio (ruta fija/demanda-respuesta) y el tipo de localización (urbana/rural), pero no con el desempleo local agregado, la variabilidad de las tasas de desempleo local o las políticas locales de asistencia social. La propensión a ganar salarios más altos está relacionada con el tipo de servicio de transporte del empleo y la localización, y las tasas de desempleo locales. Los resultados implican la necesidad de planes coordinados de transporte del empleo basados en las condiciones locales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents early evidence on the employment effects of state minimum wage increases enacted between January 2013 and January 2015. As of 2015, we estimate that relatively large minimum wage increases (defined as those exceeding $1) reduced employment among low‐skilled population groups by just over 1 percentage point. Smaller minimum wage increases, as well as increases linked to inflation indexation provisions, appear to have had much smaller (and possibly positive) effects on employment over our sample period. The estimates thus raise the potential importance of nonlinearities in the minimum wage's effects, which are consistent with standard models of the labor market. (JEL H11, J08, J23) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The current economic crisis has had spatially differentiated impacts in both the US and Europe. A growing collection of literature investigates the determinants of the magnitude of this recession across regions. This paper aims to contribute to this literature by analysing variations in unemployment rate across European regions over the period 2004-11. In particular, we focus on two apparently neglected issues, namely labour market rigidity and the sensitivity of the local economy to the national or European business cycle. The rigidity of the labour market is increasingly viewed as a possible reason for differences among countries in terms of the performance of labour markets, although existing empirical evidence remains inconclusive. In this respect, our aim is to assess the relevance of national labour legislation, as measured by the OECD Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) Index for the performance of regional labour markets by taking advantage of the natural experiment provided by the crisis. Furthermore, for the first time in economic literature, we employ quarterly data on unemployment rate for all European regions over the period 2000-11 to construct an index of co-movement regarding regional cycles with national or European cycles, to be used as an important determinant of variation in the unemployment rate. After controlling for a number of covariates, as well as for spatial dependence in various forms, our results indicate that EPL did not affect unemployment growth over the entire period. However, we did find that regions with a low long-term unemployment rate in countries with high EPL performed better in the pre-crisis period (2004-07), whereas no effect was found during the crisis. We also found that synchronisation of the regional cycle with the national one was significant for explaining regional labour market performance. Taken together, these results denote the limited relevance of national policies and legislation for accommodating spatially differentiated shocks, whereas policies aimed at modifying local cycles may prove to be more effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper investigates the impact of the joint child custody reforms on family labour supply in the United States between the 1970s and 1990s. Following the work of Chiappori et al. (Journal of Political Economy, 2002, 110 (1): 37–72), we propose a collective labour supply model in which the custody reforms play roles of a distribution factor that influences household bargaining power. In the empirical section, using data from the March Current Population Survey and Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we find a significantly positive influence of the legality on married women's labour supply and a negative influence on their husbands’. Checking robustness with different groups: non‐migrant couples, couples with children under 18, couples with children before the passage of the laws, couples married before the reforms and couples with non‐anti‐divorce religious preference, we find the results are consistent with those of the baseline model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a narrow replication of Firpo, Fortin and Lemieux (Unconditional quantile regressions. Econometrica 2009; 77(3): 953-973), who propose a new estimation method, called 'unconditional quantile regressions'. Using their empirical example, we confirm their results for the effects of unionization on US wage inequality during the period 1983-1985 for both conditional and unconditional quantile regressions. In addition, this paper applies the proposed estimation method to another paper by Autor, Katz and Kearney (Trends in US wage inequality: revising the revisionists. Review of Economics and Statistics 2008; 90(2): 300-323). The latter paper looks at measures of wage inequality in the US labor market data over the period 1963-2005. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children of teen mothers have worse academic, labor market, and behavioral outcomes in the United States, but it is not clear whether these poor outcomes are caused by having a young mother or driven by selection into teen motherhood. Understanding the reasoning behind poor child outcomes is important for designing effective policies to improve child trajectories. Simple correlations using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79) and the NLSY79 Children and Young Adults (NLSY79CY) confirm that outcomes for children of teenage mothers are worse relative to children of older mothers. These negative relationships persist after controlling for background variables or including family fixed effects, though the magnitudes are attenuated. However, these approaches fail to fully account for selection into teen motherhood. To overcome selection, I employ an empirical strategy that relies on miscarriages to put bounds on the causal effects of teen childbearing. These bounds show that teen childbearing among mothers who choose to give birth does not cause adverse outcomes for children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two papers have recently questioned the quantitative consistency of the search and matching model. Shimer has argued that a textbook matching model is unable to explain the cyclical variation of unemployment and vacancies in the US economy. Costain and Reiter have found the existence of a trade-off in the model's performance: any attempt to change the calibrated values to improve the model's ability to predict the business cycle jeopardizes its predictions of the impact of unemployment benefits on unemployment. In surveying the literature originating in these findings, I distinguish three different avenues that have been followed to correct the model: change in wage formation, change in the calibration and changes in the model specification. The last approach seems to achieve the best results both from a business cycle and from a microeconomic viewpoint. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies industry-level dynamics and demonstrates the ability of a modified neoclassical growth model to capture a range of empirical facts. The paper begins by using U.S. data to document skilled and unskilled labor trends within industry sector classifications as well as industry sector output trends. Using Current Population Survey data from 1968 to 2004, it is shown that the ratio of skilled workers to unskilled workers employed has risen in all industries. The absolute increase in this ratio was larger in the more skilled industries, while the growth rate was larger in the less skilled industries. Furthermore, using national income account data, it is shown that relatively high-skilled industries have accounted for an increasing share of output over time. A version of the neoclassical growth model is then constructed to match these observations. One important feature of this model is a structure that introduces new goods into the economy at each moment of time. The model is able to capture a rich set of labor market movements between sectors and between skill levels as well as changes in the relative output shares across industries, yet preserves many nice features of the neoclassical growth model.( JEL E13, J20, 030) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High underemployment has been a chronic structural feature of the rural United States for decades. In this paper, we assess whether and how inequalities in underemployment between metropolitan (metro) and nonmetropolitan (nonmetro) areas have changed over the course of the last five decades. Drawing on data from the March Current Population Survey from 1968 to 2017, we analyze inequality in the prevalence of underemployment between metro and nonmetro areas of the United States, paying special attention to differences between white, black, and Hispanic workers. Our results show that the underlying risk of underemployment has increased in both metro and nonmetro areas over the last 50 years. Nonmetro workers have consistently faced greater employment hardship compared to their metro counterparts, and these differences cannot be fully explained by differences in population characteristics. Nonmetro ethnoracial minorities have experienced particularly poor labor market outcomes. The disadvantage of ethnoracial minority status and rural residence is especially pronounced for nonmetro black workers, among whom underemployment has remained persistently high with only modest convergence with other workers. Hispanic workers also face an elevated risk of underemployment, but we observe a unique convergence between metro and nonmetro workers within this population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies of workplace inequality have examined why workplace gender segregation still exists and how gender segregation affects workplaces (Cohen, Huffman, and Knauer 2009 Work and Occupations 36(4):318; Huffman, Cohen, and Pearlman 2010 Administrative Science Quarterly 55(2):255). Yet, fewer studies have examined how space might affect gender segregation. In this paper, we investigate two types of space, normative space and industrial space, and their influence on gender workplace segregation within geographic space. We use data from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and mixed models to examine how normative and industrial spaces affect workplaces within geographic space. We find that both measures of normative and industrial space predict differing levels of gender segregation within geographic spaces (measured via commuting zones). In addition, the effects normative space (women's share of the labor force) has on gender segregation are mediated by industrial restructuring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper demonstrates how the labour and product markets interact in determining as outcome a generalized reduced-form price Phillips curve. For the labour market we consider a wage Phillips curve and for the product market a price Phillips curve. We estimate separately the wage and price Phillips curves for the USA, using ordinary least squares, non-parametric estimation and three-stage least squares techniques. The finding is that wages are always more flexible than prices with respect to their respective demand pressure and that price inflation responds somewhat more to a medium-run cost pressure than does wage inflation. The implications for macroeconomic stability are demonstrated. We also show—as a link between product and labour markets—that employment is related to output as Okun's law states. In comparing linear and non-linear estimates of the wage and price Phillips curves we find furthermore that for some relationships non-linearities are important while not for others. Although overall the non-linear estimates tend to confirm our linear estimates, non-linearities in some relationships of the Phillips curve are important as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The decline in the scope and power of American unions has led to a search for new strategies and new organizational forms to better succeed in representing the interests of employees in the labour market. This paper examines the role of community-based organizations of the sort that proved so powerful during the Civil Rights Movement. The subject of the paper is a strong national network of community organizations that is neighbourhood-based and draws heavily on churches and other community institutions. The organizations are put together in neighbourhoods, yet they also wield power at the city and state levels. The paper describes the organizations and examines and assesses their labour market policies. The second part of the paper takes up organizational issues and, in particular, describes how the structure and culture of these organizations enable them to avoid some of the organizational perils that have befallen unions and other social movement organizations. The paper concludes by comparing these organizations with traditional unions and by discussing their prospects for growth as well as their limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment incentives targeted at attracting multinational firms have been extensively researched, and empirical evidence has shown them to be influential. The same is not true of exit restrictions. Yet, as recent theory suggests, there may be a trade-off between entry incentives and ease of exit. This paper focuses on that trade-off in the case of US multinationals in 33 host countries. An indicator of labour market regulations is used as a measure of ease of exit. Results suggest that both entry incentives and labour market regulations are important and ignoring the latter neglects an important dimension in firms' location decision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a series of articles that deal with the impact of the living wage movement on the U.S. labor market.

Much recent research on US labour markets has turned to tracing out the dramatic changes that accompanied and followed the events of the Great Recession (2007-2009). But to date this research has led to more temporal as opposed to spatial detail about those changes. This paper uses an online data set to assess the relative economic health (performance) of the US's more than 350 metropolitan labour markets during and after the Great Recession. These data address both the current level (e.g. unemployment rate) and the recent trend (e.g. 3-year job growth) in the economic health of those labour markets. Multivariate analysis generates one sub-index for level and a second sub-index for trend and then an overall performance index is calculated. But, after recognising that heterogeneity in these labour markets exists according to their different sizes, this paper re-examines those online data using four separate population size classes. New indices are then generated reflecting the relative sizes of the metropolitan labour markets and the new rankings that follow differ in important ways from the original rankings. The findings also indicate a disjuncture now exists between the economic health of Snowbelt versus Sunbelt cities. Coming immediately out of the Great Recession the average economic health of Northern cities is much better than that of Southern cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper has developed a model of the labor market in which workers (a) face a stochastic demand for their labor at a given wage and (b) must incur a transactions cost to enter the labor force. In this context, plausible assumptions about workers' utility functions lead the effective supply of labor depending on the probability of rationing. The paper uses these theoretical underpinnings to formulate econometric models and applies maximum likelihood estimation to an aggregate labor market in which labor supply is a. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Labor market frictions are able to induce sluggish aggregate employment dynamics. However, these frictions have strong implications for the source of this propagation: they distort the path of aggregate employment by impeding the flow of labor across firms. For a canonical class of frictions, we show how observable measures of such flows can be used to assess the effect of frictions on aggregate employment dynamics. Application of this approach to establishment microdata for the United States reveals that the empirical flow of labor across firms deviates markedly from the predictions of canonical labor market frictions. Despite their ability to induce persistence in aggregate employment, firm‐size flows in these models are predicted to respond aggressively to aggregate shocks, but react sluggishly in the data. The paper therefore concludes that the propagation mechanism embodied in standard models of labor market frictions fails to account for the sources of observed employment dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Regional Science Policy & Practice is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In the extant literature of business cycle predictions, the signals for business cycle turning points are generally issued with a lag of at least 5 months. In this paper, we make use of a novel and timely indicator-the Google search volume data-to help to improve the timeliness of business cycle turning point identification. We identify multiple query terms to capture the real-time public concern on the aggregate economy, the credit market, and the labor market condition. We incorporate the query indices in a Markov-switching framework and successfully 'nowcast' the peak date within a month that the turning occurred. ( JEL E37, G17) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT This paper examines the possibility of unit roots in the presence of endogenously determined multiple structural breaks in the total, female and male labour force participation rates (LFPR) for Australia, Canada and the USA. We extend the procedure of Gil-Alana for a single structural break to the case of multiple structural breaks at endogenously determined dates using the principles suggested by Bai and Perron. We use the Robinson LM test to determine the fractional order of integration. We find that endogenously determined structural breaks render the total, female and male LFPR series stationary or at best mean-reverting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to the dramatic rise in the number of unauthorized immigrants to the United States, every state has passed some form of immigration legislation. These laws appear to be predicated on a belief that unauthorized immigrants impose greater costs than benefits to state and local communities, including the labor market. The purpose of this paper is to examine some evidence on what workers should expect if the immigration legislation is successful in eliminating undocumented workers from states' labor markets. © 2012 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

About 75 percent of U. S.-trained, noncitizen Ph Ds in science and engineering work in the United States after graduation, and 54 percent of those who stay take postdoctoral positions. The probability of postdoctoral participation is substantially higher for temporary visa holders than for permanent visa holders because of visa-related restrictions in the U. S. labor market. To identify the causal effects of visa status on entry into a postdoctoral position, this paper uses a unique shock to visa status generated by the Chinese Student Protection Act of 1992. Eligibility for the act is used as an instrumental variable for visa status. Two-stage least-square estimates show that permanent visa holders are 24 percent less likely to take postdoctoral positions than temporary visa holders. The effects of a permanent visa vary considerably across research fields, but for most fields, it reduces postdoctoral participation significantly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is commonly argued that skilled immigration benefits the destination country through several channels. Yet, only a limited number of countries report having policies in place aimed at increasing the intake of skilled immigrants. Why? In this paper, we analyse the factors that affect a direct measure of individual attitudes towards skilled migration. We focus on two main channels: the labour market and the welfare state. We find that more educated natives are less likely to favour skilled immigration - consistent with the labour market channel - while richer people are more likely to do so - in accordance with the welfare state channel under the tax adjustment model. Our findings thus suggest that the labour market competition threat perceived by skilled natives in the host countries might be driving the observed cautious policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the relationship between offshoring and the labor market in an occupational choice model of trade and endogenous growth where workers are employed on the basis of their individual skill levels. Trade liberalization leads to offshoring and reduces employment in the manufacturing sector. Displaced workers move into traditional and innovation sectors according to their skill levels, shaping real wages and aggregate productivity in the manufacturing sector. The paper aims to show how inter-sectoral labor market adjustments, highlighted by skill heterogeneity, could be a possible explanation for the simultaneous rise in productivity and reduction in real wages that have coincided with the sharp escalation of offshoring activities in the U.S. manufacturing sector since 2004. ( JEL F16, F23, J24) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is worldwide concern about the vulnerability of the current labour force to displacement by future imported services. In the USA, some have suggested that as much as one-third of the workforce might be vulnerable to such outsourcing. However, the labour market impacts of this displacement are difficult to assess using purely analytical or statistical approaches. In this paper, simulation methods are used to understand how sensitive the US economy and labour market are to increases in services imports. Specifically, the scenario examined assumes that the share of imported services in total employment increases from 0.8 per cent to 7.25 per cent over a time horizon in which workers are unable to change occupations. In response, it is found that all industries increase their use of imported services and their use of the composite input that is comprised of imported services and tradable labour. With the exception of legal workers, all workers in tradable occupations experience declines in their real wages. Demand for non-tradable occupations labour rises in the industries that expand the most, while demand falls in shrinking industries. The non-tradable occupations that are used intensively in the shrinking industries experience declines in real wages, while the real wages rise for workers in non-tradable occupations used intensively in the expanding industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effects of knowledge about a wide variety of subjects on the wages and salaries of U.S. workers. Knowing a lot about topics such as medicine and dentistry, engineering and technology, and production and processing has a positive effect on individual earnings, whereas high knowledge in the areas of food production and personnel and human resources is not rewarded in the labor market. Spillover effects, where the share of metropolitan area employment in high-knowledge occupations enhances earnings, were uncovered primarily in subjects related to producer services and information technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses data from the Health Survey for England between 1991 and 2004 to examine the labour market impact of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA). Consistent with previous evidence in the UK and the USA, this study finds no evidence of a positive employment effect of the introduction of the DDA. Sensitivity analysis, using the small firm exemption of the DDA, and controlling for changes in the composition of the disabled, is used to test the robustness of the main results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past five years the world has witnessed a spectacular boom in asset prices. This paper reviews different explanations for this phenomenon, and argues that future financial historians will point to the divergence between high returns on capital and the low cost of capital, not to excess liquidity or asset shortage, as the driving force in global asset markets. The integration of the massive Asian labour force into the world economy has significantly increased global returns on capital while the cost of capital as measured by long-term real interest rates has not increased, but has actually fallen. We label this two-sided phenomenon ‘Chimerica’ because it is in large measure consequence of the symbiotic economic relationship that has developed between the People's Republic of China and the United States of America. Not only has plentiful Chinese and Asian labour increased global returns to capital; Chinese excess savings have also depressed US and global interest rates. We show that the Chinese ‘savings glut’ was not primarily a function of precautionary household behaviour, but of surging corporate profits in China due to increasing exchange rate undervaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the causes of mass migration from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) to the United States in recent decades and how these migrants have fared in US labour markets. The evidence shows that LAC migrants have higher unemployment rates and substantially lower wages than other immigrants and natives. Furthermore, the relative wages of LAC migrants have been declining sharply over the last 25 years. The most significant factor explaining the latter is the lower (and declining) educational attainment of LAC migrants relative to other immigrants and natives, compounded by the rising rates of return to education in the US. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence during the nineties about the response of real wages to shocks highlights that this response is substantially lower in European countries than in the United States and that there are important differences among European countries. Which are the reasons that explain these different reactions? In this paper, we apply meta-analytical techniques in order to provide a quantitative summary of the available evidence regarding the influence of labour market institutions on real wage flexibility. We find that the design of the study affects the obtained results, and that in more deregulated labour markets with a lower presence of trade unions, this response is particularly larger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critics of globalization claim that firms are being driven by the prospects of cheaper labor and lower labor standards to shift employment abroad. Yet the evidence, beyond anecdotes, is slim. This paper reports stylized facts on the activities of U.S. multinationals at home and abroad for the years 1977 to 1999. We focus on firms in manufacturing and services, two sectors that have received extensive media attention for supposedly exporting jobs. Using firm-level data collected by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) in Washington, D.C., we report correlations between U.S. multinational employment at home and abroad. Preliminary evidence based on the operations of these multinationals suggests that the sign of the correlation depends on the crucial distinction between affiliates in high-income and low-income countries. For affiliates in high-income countries there is a positive correlation between jobs at home and abroad, suggesting that foreign employment of U.S. multinationals is complementary to domestic employment. For firms that operate in developing countries, employment has been cut in the United States, and affiliate employment has increased. To account for firm size, substitution across firms and entry and exit, we aggregate our data to the industry level. This exercise reveals that the observed “complementarity” between U.S. and foreign jobs has been driven largely by a contraction across all manufacturing sectors. It also reveals that foreign employment in developing countries has substituted for U.S. employment in several highly visible industries, including computers, electronics, and transportation. The fact that there were U.S. jobs lost to foreign affiliates in key sectors, despite broad complementarity in hiring and firing decisions between U.S. parents and their affiliates, helps explain why economists view the impact of globalization on U.S. jobs as benign despite negative news coverage for declining industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses a 1993 court case, Cook v. Rhode Island, in conjunction with the implementation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to estimate the impact of employment protection on the labor market outcomes of obese people in the U.S. In Cook, a federal appeals court ruled for the first time that obesity can be covered under the ADA. Using data from 1988 to 1999, I estimate that Cook increased employment for obese women and men relative to those whose weight was in the recommended range on the order of four and two percentage points, respectively. The results provide new evidence that obesity has important labor market implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores changing relationships between apparel firms and rural labor markets in Wisconsin over the last decade. Mainstream explanations of recent changes in the apparel industry suggest that rural communities will lose tedious or physically demanding, low-skilled apparel manufacturing jobs but will gain more information-intensive and desirable "apparel service" employment. Through case studies of apparel firms located in two Wisconsin communities, the paper argues that current changes in the industry not only affect communities unevenly but, even in regions where apparel service firms have provided significant numbers of new jobs, these jobs are less well paid, more casually structured, and less secure than manufacturing employment has been. The paper argues that current concepts of the economic embeddedness of firms in communities need to be refined to permit consideration of the kinds of leverage and voice that community organizations have in confronting new forms of corporate capital. The two case studies demonstrate that corporate embeddedness and its labor market outcomes are linked to changes in the global market in which firms compete. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior studies suggest that the passage of the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) in 1986 signalled a deterioration in the labour market conditions of Mexican migrants. In this paper, we examine whether and how labour market conditions worsened for Dominicans and Nicaraguans after 1986, and the extent to which these shifts were comparable to those experienced by Mexicans. Our analysis relies on a new source of data that offers comparable data across the three national origins. We estimate multivariate models that capture the effects of demographic attributes, human and social capital, migration-specific human and social capital, legal status, period of trip, national origin, and other controls on the hourly wages earned by household heads and whether they received cash wages on their last US trip. Models with interaction terms reveal significant pre- and post-1986 wage effects, but few differences in these effects between Mexicans and Dominicans or Nicaraguans. In contrast, group differences appear in the risk of cash receipt of wages. Dominicans and Nicaraguans experienced a greater increase in this risk relative to Mexicans pre- and post-1986. Together, these findings depict a broader, negative impact of IRCA on Latino migrant wages than has been documented elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The issue of outsourcing has been a hot topic especially in the last election year in the U.S. At the heart of this debate has been the effect of investment of U.S. firms overseas and the assumed correlation of this with job losses in the U.S. While this certainly may have some validity in certain industries, the assumed correlation is not a universal truth. It is the aim of this article to examine the relationship between foreign direct investment and domestic employment. The authors focus their research on the food manufacturing and textile industries.

This paper focuses on the stylized differences in work organizations and labour market practices between the United States and Japan concerning multi-skilling, delegation, continuous process improvement, human capital accumulation and labour turnover. It presents a model that addresses interconnections among three key features of work organizations (multi-skilling, delegation and continuous process improvement), and examines ways in which they are related to labour market practices. It analyses strategic interactions among firms concerning their choices of work organization, and shows that strategic complementarity arising from labour market externality can yield the multiplicity of equilibria that provides a systematic explanation for the differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]