DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS WORKING PAPER SERIES Analyzing Skilled and Unskilled Labor Efficiencies in the US
نویسنده
چکیده
In this paper, using a production framework in which skilled and unskilled labor are imperfect substitutes, I analyze the time paths of the efficiencies of skilled and unskilled labor and their implications for economic growth and wage inequality in the US between 1950 and 2005. There are two main findings. First, I find that skilled labor efficiency has grown more slowly since the mid 1970s. Second and more interestingly, I find that beginning in the early 1970s, there has been a considerable decline in the absolute level of the efficiency of unskilled labor, implying that the decline has played a significant role in the overall productivity slowdown and the substantial widening in the U.S. wage structure. JEL Codes: E13, J31, O30, O47, and O51
منابع مشابه
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS WORKING PAPER SERIES Analyzing Skilled and Unskilled Labor Efficiencies in US
In this paper, using a production framework in which skilled and unskilled labor are imperfect substitutes, we analyze the time paths of the efficiencies of skilled and unskilled labor and their implications for wage inequality and economic growth. We find no evidence that supports the common view that there has been an acceleration in skilled biased technical change. Indeed, after 1973 the eff...
متن کاملDEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS WORKING PAPER SERIES Firm Heterogeneity, Trade, and Wage Inequality
This paper considers a world of two symmetric countries with two factors and two sectors. Outputs of the two sectors are imperfect substitutes and sectors differ in relative factor intensity. Each sector contains a continuum of heterogenous firms that produce differentiated goods within their sector. Trade is costly and there are both variable and fixed costs of exporting. The paper shows that ...
متن کاملThe Impact of International Migration on the Economy with the Assumption of Labor Heterogeneity
T his study investigated the effect of international labor migration on Iran’s economy using a neo-classical growth model with the assumption of labor heterogeneity within the framework of dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model. After solving the model, the obtained equations were linearized and different values were assigned to the parameters according to Iran’s economy inform...
متن کاملNber Working Paper Series Technological Superiority and the Losses from Migration
Two facts motivate this study. (1) The United States is the world’s most productive economy. (2) The US is the destination for a broad range of net factor inflows: unskilled labor, skilled labor, and capital. Indeed, these two facts may be strongly related: All factors seek to enter the US because of the US technological superiority. The literature on international factor flows rarely links the...
متن کاملImpacts of Import Tariff Cuts on the Iranian Labor Market Structure: a Computable General Equilibrium Model Approach
Most debates about the role of tariff cuts on the level of employment and rate of wages in labor market have come out of well-known Hecscher â Ohlin and Stopler â Samuelson (HOS) theorems. Considering the fact that we have divided the workforce into skilled and unskilled labors the present paper assesses the impacts of tariff cuts on labor market indicators in Iran. To address these issues...
متن کامل