Churning dynamics: an analysis of hires and separations at the employer level

This paper provides evidence on job flows and worker flows at the level of the employer. We ask whether firms grow by increasing hires, reducing separations, or both, and we develop a graphical approach to address this. We use a new dataset to estimate the relationship between job flows and worker flows at the employer level. We show that most employers are simultaneously hiring and facing separations. We also show that declining firms continue to hire, and growing firms continue to lose workers. The relationship between hires and separations differs between employers, varying with size, average wage and industry. q 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. JEL classification: J60; J63