Economic theory suggests that women's labour supply decisions can be understood through the careful modelling of their preferences for work and leisure and of the constraints that they face. Potential factors that influence this decision-making process might be of an economic, demographic or institutional nature. The present paper reviews the empirical evidence on the influence of these factors on women's labour supply in Australia. It shows that while there is a broad consensus in some areas, there is generally a wide range of findings in relation to each potential determinant of labour supply. Moreover, this does not seem to have been narrowed by the use of more sophisticated methodology.

Studies of the Labour Supply of Australian Women: What Have We Learned?

RECENT work has suggested that there is an association between the degree of concentration in an industry and the speed at which prices adjust to changes in prime costs (Cagan [8], Domberger [12, 13], Scherer [21], p. 356 and the references cited therein). Apart from its intrinsic interest to students of industrial economics, there would seem to be three reasons for investigating this association. First, to see what light, if any, it throws upon the influence of industrial structure on the price level together with the rate (and process) of inflation. Secondly, to test the assumption made in some influential studies (e.g. Godley and Nordhaus [15]; Coutts, Godley and Nordhaus [10] and Haig and Wood [ 18]) that the size of the lag between cost and price changes is solely dependent upon the length of the fabrication, production and delivery period in the various industries. The third reason is a 'belief', held by the author, that distributed lag coefficients in econometric studies should be subject to analysis and not left 'hanging in the air'. As part of the development of a large scale econornetric model of the Australian economy (the IMP model) a team of researchers (under the direction of Dr Brain) at Melbourne University have estimated price-prime cost equations for 43 manufacturing sectors, using annual data referring to the period 1948/49-1973/74.1 The estimating equation is of the form:

Industry structure and the speed of price adjustment

This article surveys the Australian literature on the labour market involvement of women. The increasing prominence of women in the workforce has generated a research effort designed to investigate various aspects of women's employment, unemployment, work experience and earnings. Recently there has been an upsurge of interest in women's issues which has prompted an intensification of research into the role of women in the labour market. However, there remain a number of impor tant gaps in our understanding of that role, notably with regard to the workforce behaviour of women, the factors influencing the maintenance of occupational segregation of the sexes, and the significance and nature of discrimination in depressing the relative earnings of women.

The Role of Women in the Australian Labour Market: A Survey of the Literature

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The model is motivated by data showing that the Australian production of local manufactures is hurt by depreciations and invigorated by appreciations. The paper briefly presents such evidence and then proceeds to a theoretical analysis. The model aims to capture short-to-medium run exchange rate effects in an economy with goods and services aggregated into four commodities: (i) imports; (ii) local manufactures; (iii) services; and (iv) rural goods (agricultural, pastoral, forestry, fishing and mining products). With the exception of rural goods, each commodity comprises consumer goods as well as inputs into the other sectors. Rural goods enter consumption only indirectly after processing by the manufacturing sector. Exports are exclusively rural goods. The model has a Keynesian flavour in that the production of local manufactures and services is not constrained by the availability of resources and of labour. Variable inputs per unit of output are assumed to be constant. There are also fixed inputs. Variable inputs are imports in the case of the import sector; rural goods and imports in the case of the local manufacturing sector; and labour in the case of the services sector. The prices of imports, local manufactures and services are set by constant mark-up factors on variable costs. This assumption is based on a picture of imperfect competition with constant elasticity of demand at the firm level. The extreme capital intensity of rural goods production is taken into account by modelling total production of rural goods as an exogenous parameter. The price of rural goods is determined in the export market. It falls with increasing exports. The economy is not assumed to be small in its export market. The domestic consumption demand schedule is modelled as predetermined in the sense that in the time span under consideration the relationship between quantities consumed and nominal prices is not affected by the exchange rate. The nominal wage rate is assumed to be predetermined in the same sense. No specific functional form is imposed on the consumption demand schedule: the analysis is based on general assumptions, mainly non-inferiority and gross substitutability. In view of gross substitutability, there is a competitive relationship between imports and local manufactures. Adepreciation raises the price of imports and ceteris paribus such an increase raises the consumption of manufactures. However, the analysis shows that this enhancing influence of a depreciation on manufacturing is weaker than other causal channels that work in the opposite direction. An increase in the price of imports (and exportables) raises variable costs and thereby the price of local manufactures. This leads to a decrease in the output of local manufactures. In the course of the analysis, it is first shown that a uniquely determined equilibrium exists for every exchange rate above a lower bound. Then the effects of a change in the exchange rate are investigated. In most cases the results are unambiguous. In particular this is true for the output and the price of local manufactures. Other conclusions are that a depreciation increases exports and the amount of services provided. In some cases unequivocal results can be obtained only with the help of further assumptions. This concerns the domestic price of rural goods, the balance of trade in domestic prices and import penetration.

Local Manufacturing Hurt by Depreciations in a Theoretical Model Reflecting the Australian Experience

Married women in the australian workforce a rejoinder

This study is concerned with an effort to analyze changes in costs and prices in the Australian economy by tracing the effects of changes in wages and import prices through the stages of production, using a disaggregated input-output model with lags. The object of constructing the model was to improve, by introducing lags, the accuracy of predictions of the effect of cost changes on prices, and to show the lag structures. Data problems encountered are discussed, and the need for integration of price statistics to enhance their usefulness for analyses such as this is emphasized. Concepts and sources of data are discussed in some detail in an appendix.

Margaret P. Wood

Papers

Married women in the australian workforce a rejoinder

Tracing price changes through stages of production: australia, 1968 to 19771