Showing papers by "Lawrence F. Katz published in 1996"

What We Know and Do Not Know About the Natural Rate of Unemployment

Abstract: Over the past three decades, a large amount of research has attempted to identify the determinants of the natural rate of unemployment. It is this body of work we assess in this paper. We reach two main conclusions. First, there has been considerable theoretical progress over the past 30 years. A framework has emerged. We present it, and show how it can be used to think for example about the relation between technological progrss and unemployment. Second, empirical knowledge lags behind. Economists do not have a good quantitative understanding of the determinants of the natural rate, either across time or across countries. We look at two issues, the relation of wages to unemployment, and the risk of European unemployment.

Searching for the Effect of Immigration on the Labor Market

Abstract: We compare two approaches to analyzing the effects of immigration on the labor market and find that the estimated effect of immigration on U.S. native labor outcomes depends critically on the empirical experiment used. Area analyses contrast the level or change in immigration by area with the level or change in the outcomes of non- immigrant workers. Factor proportions analyses treat immigrants as a source of increased national supply of workers of the relevant skill. Cross-section comparisons of wages and immigration in the 1980 and 1990 Censuses yield unstable results casting doubt on the validity of these calculations. Analyses of changes over time for various education groups within regions give negative estimated immigration effects, which increase in magnitude the wider the area covered. Factor proportions calculations show that immigration was somewhat important in reducing the relative pay of U.S. high school dropouts during the 1980s, while immigration and trade contributed much more modestly to the falling pay of high school equivalent workers. The different effects of immigration on native outcomes in the area and factor proportions methodologies appear to result from the diluting effect of native migration flows across regions and failure to take adequate account of other regional labor market conditions in area comparisons.

Searching for the effect of immigration on the labor market.

Abstract: We compare two approaches to analyzing the effects of immigration on the labor market and find that the estimated effect of immigration on U.S. native labor outcomes depends critically on the empirical experiment used. Area analyses contrast the level or change in immigration by area with the level or change in the outcomes of non-immigrant workers. Factor proportions analyses treat immigrants as a source of increased national supply of workers of the relevant skill....The different effects of immigration on native outcomes in the area and factor proportions methodologies appear to result from the diluting effect of native migration flows across regions and failure to take adequate account of other regional labor market conditions in area comparisons. (EXCERPT)

Wage Subsidies for the Disadvantaged

Abstract: Wage subsidies to private employers have often been proposed by economists as a potentially flexible and efficient method to improve the earnings and employment of low-wage workers. This paper lays out the basic economics of wage subsidies; examines issues arising in the design of alternative forms of wage subsidies; and reviews evidence on the effectiveness of recent U.S. wage subsidy programs and demonstration projects. Wage subsidies to employers to hire disadvantaged workers appear to modestly raise the demand for labor for those workers. Stand-alone wage subsidies (or employment tax credits) that are highly targeted on very specific groups (such as welfare recipients) appear to have low utilization rates and may (in some cases) stigmatize the targeted group. But new evidence based on an examination of changes in eligibility rules for the Targeted Jobs Tax Credit, the major U.S. wage subsidy program for the economically disadvantaged from 1979 to 1994, suggests modest positive employment effects of the TJTC on economically disadvantaged young adults. Policies combining wage subsidies with job development, training, and job search assistance efforts appear to have been somewhat successful in improving the employment and earnings of specific targeted disadvantaged groups.

Wage Subsidies for the Disadvantaged

Abstract: Wage subsidies to private employers have often been proposed by economists as a potentially flexible and efficient method to improve the earnings and employment of low-wage workers. This paper lays out the basic economics of wage subsidies; examines issues arising in the design of alternative forms of wage subsidies; and reviews evidence on the effectiveness of recent U.S. wage subsidy programs and demonstration projects. Wage subsidies to employers to hire disadvantaged workers appear to modestly raise the demand for labor for those workers. Stand-alone wage subsidies (or employment tax credits) that are highly targeted on very specific groups (such as welfare recipients) appear to have low utilization rates and may (in some cases) stigmatize the targeted group. But new evidence based on an examination of changes in eligibility rules for the Targeted Jobs Tax Credit, the major U.S. wage subsidy program for the economically disadvantaged from 1979 to 1994, suggests modest positive employment effects of the TJTC on economically disadvantaged young adults. Policies combining wage subsidies with job development, training, and job search assistance efforts appear to have been somewhat successful in improving the employment and earnings of specific targeted disadvantaged groups.

The Origins of Technology-Skill Complementarity

Abstract: Current concern with relationships among particular technologies, capital and the wage structure motivates this study of the origins of technology-skill complementarity in manufacturing. We offer evidence of the existence of technology-skill and capital-skill (relative) complementarities from 1909 to 1929 and suggest that they were associated with continuous-process and batch methods and the adoption of electric motors. Industries that used more capital per worker and a greater proportion of their horsepower in the form of purchased electricity employed relatively more educated blue-collar workers in 1940 and paid their blue-collar workers substantially more from 1909 to 1929. We also infer capital-skill complementarity using the wage-bill for non-production workers and find that the relationship was as large from 1909-19 as it has been recently. Finally, we link our findings to those on the high- school movement (1910 to 1940). The rapid increase in the supply of skills from 1910 to 1940 may have prevented rising inequality with technological change.

Searching for the Effect of Immigration on the Labor Market

Abstract: We compare two approaches to analyzing the effects of immigration on the labor market and find that the estimated effect of immigration on U.S. native labor outcomes depends critically on the empirical experiment used. Area analyses contrast the level or change in immigration by area with the level or change in the outcomes of non- immigrant workers. Factor proportions analyses treat immigrants as a source of increased national supply of workers of the relevant skill. Cross-section comparisons of wages and immigration in the 1980 and 1990 Censuses yield unstable results casting doubt on the validity of these calculations. Analyses of changes over time for various education groups within regions give negative estimated immigration effects, which increase in magnitude the wider the area covered. Factor proportions calculations show that immigration was somewhat important in reducing the relative pay of U.S. high school dropouts during the 1980s, while immigration and trade contributed much more modestly to the falling pay of high school equivalent workers. The different effects of immigration on native outcomes in the area and factor proportions methodologies appear to result from the diluting effect of native migration flows across regions and failure to take adequate account of other regional labor market conditions in area comparisons.

What We Know and Do Not Know about the Natural Rate of Unemployment

Abstract: Over the past three decades, a large amount of research has attempted to identify the determinants of the natural rate of unemployment. It is this body of work we assess in this paper.