A new GLO Discussion Paper highlights the impact of delay and the importance of structuring bankruptcy procedures to rapidly resolve uncertainty about firms’ future prospects.
Author Abstract: Bankruptcy restructuring procedures are used in most legal systems to decide the fate of businesses facing financial hardship. We study how bargaining failures in such procedures impact the economic performance of participating firms in the context of Croatia, which introduced a “pre-bankruptcy settlement” (PBS) process in the wake of the Great Recession of 2007 – 2009. Local institutions left over from the communist era provide annual financial statements for both sides of more than 180,000 debtor- creditor pairs, enabling us to address selection into failed negotiations by matching a rich set of creditor and debtor characteristics. Failures to settle at the PBS stage due to idiosyncratic bargaining problems, which effectively delays entry into the standard bankruptcy procedure, leads to a lower rate of survival among debtors as well as re- duced employment, revenue, and profits. We also track how bargaining failures diffuse through the network of creditors, finding a significant negative effect on small creditors, but not others. Our results highlight the impact of delay and the importance of structuring bankruptcy procedures to rapidly resolve uncertainty about firms’ future prospects.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: Information and communication technology (ICT) challenges traditional assumptions about the capacity to manage workers beyond organizational and physical boundaries. A typology connects a variety of non-traditional work organizations made possible by ICT, including offshoring, outsourcing, remote work, virtual companies, and platforms. A model illustrates how new technology serves as a proximate cause for a revision of social contracts between capital, labor and government reached through bargaining, and how external shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the institutional environment, and limitations in practice influence how technology changes the organization of work. An historical case illustrates the general features of the model, and a review of the outsourcing and offshoring literature provides instructive examples of how features of the model will potentially influence the future of post-pandemic remote work
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper revisits the influential theory of monopolistic competition and optimum product variety. Differences in factor endowments across countries determine the pattern of trade between varieties and output per variety, which is indeterminate the standard model.
Author Abstract: In this paper we revisit the influential theory of monopolistic competition and optimum product variety as developed by Dixit and Stiglitz (1977) with applications in international trade by Krugman (1979,1980), by modeling fixed and variable costs of production in terms of underlying use of skilled and unskilled labor in a single good model. This is different from earlier work on multi sector variant of Krugman cum Heckscher-Ohlin-Samuelson model such as Helpman (1981) and others. In our structure factor endowment and factor intensities determine both number of varieties and output per variety in a closed economy mimicking the features of Heckscher-Ohlin-Samuelson model. Differences in factor endowments across countries determine the pattern of trade between varieties and output per variety, which is indeterminate in a standard single good Dixit-Stiglitz-Krugman model. Later we reflect on wage inequality and unemployment providing some interesting results.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: Academic consensus about normative prescriptions on the ethnic and cultural composition of societies has been shifting in recent decades. It has evolved from what seemed desirable but was acknowledged to be unrealistic (the noble idea of a melting pot), to what is realistic because it has already happened, but might be undesirable in the long run: the multicultural diaspora. Plural societies, an unintended consequence of multiculturalism, lurk in the background. Thus scholars of social and economic questions, as well as societies, face a threehorned dilemma. We throw some light on the dilemma by examining school friendship networks in five European countries with recent immigration. Our results highlight the force of elective affinities in overcoming differences, but they also point to the countervailing forces of elective discordance that are currently driving increasing division.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: This article explores the gender gap in time allocation in Europe, offering up-to-date statistics and information on several factors that may help to explain these differences. Prior research has identified several factors affecting the time individuals devote to paid work, unpaid work, and child care, and the gender gaps in these activities, but most research refers to single countries, and general patterns are rarely explored. Cross-country evidence on gender gaps in paid work, unpaid work, and child care is offered, and explanations based on education, earnings, and household structure are presented, using data from the EUROSTAT and the Multinational Time Use Surveys. There are large cross-country differences in the gender gaps in paid work, unpaid work, and child care, which remain after controlling for socio-demographic characteristics, although the gender gap in paid work dissipates when the differential gendered relationship between socio-demographic characteristics and paid work is taken into account. This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of gender gaps in Europe, helping to focus recent debates on how to tackle inequality in Europe, and clarifying the factors that contribute to gender inequalities in the uses of time.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that menstrual restriction related rituals can have persistent negative implications on women’s physical and mental health that is not just limited to the time of menstruation.
Author Abstract: We study the association between the ritual of menstrual restrictions and maternal health- care access as well as women’s subjective well-being. Similar restrictions, also practised around the time of childbirth, are based on the assumption that women are ritually impure during these phases of their lives. Although menstrual taboos and restrictions are common across many developing countries, we use micro-data from Nepal where these rituals are widely prevalent. We use a rich set of controls as well as assess the sensitivity of our results to alternative estimation methods. We find that women who face any menstrual restriction are also more likely to give birth at home and receive assistance only from untrained individuals during childbirth, which increases the risk of maternal mortality. We find that only the strictest menstrual restrictions are associated with a decline in subjective well-being. These findings indicate that menstrual restriction related rituals can have persistent negative implications on women’s physical and mental health that is not just limited to the time of menstruation.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper reports a stark difference in rural India between men and women: while many male workers took up informal employment, most female workers dropped out of the labor force.
Author Abstract: This paper presents evidence on the short and long-term impact of the first COVID-19 wave on India’s rural youth. We interviewed about 2,000 vocational trainees from Bihar and Jharkhand between March 2020 and March 2021. We report a stark difference between men and women: while many male workers took up informal employment, most female workers dropped out of the labour force. Using a randomised experiment, we find that a government supported digital job platform does not increase job search or employment. Our findings suggest that bridging the gap between rural youths and urban formal labour markets requires much more active and targeted policy interventions, especially for female workers.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
We analyse the different fiscal treatment of married and cohabiting couples across all EU Member States using microsimulation methods. Our paper highlights important differences across EU countries’ tax-benefit systems, where seven countries show substantial bonuses for married couples and four exhibit marriage penalties. On a micro level, we find that these marriage bonuses/penalties differ substantially across household types and income. From a policy point of view, our results suggest that the abolishment of marriage-related tax-benefit components in countries with marriage bonuses would leave some households financially worse off but would increase governments revenues that could be spent to targeted support of specific groups. From both an equity and a gender equality point of view, this abolishment would be desirable.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Presentations in this series are based on the projects that GLO-VirtYS program scholars completed as part of the their program participation. See for the details VirtYs program and the cohort 2021.
September 9th 2021 Program on 1 pm London/UK time.
Jun Hyung Kim, Jinan University and GLO Affiliate Mental Health Consequences of Working from Home during the Pandemic (GLO VirtYS program advisor Professor Jan van Ours)
Femke Cnossen, University of Groningen and GLO Affiliate Learning the Right Skill: Revealed Local Labour Demand for Underlying Skills in STEM and Non-STEM Graduates (GLO VirtYS program advisors Dr Matloob Piracha and Dr Guy Tchuente)
Chaired by GLO VirtYS Program Director Olena Nizalova.
Featured Image: Employee-Training-unsplash
Jun Hyung Kim is an assistant professor of economics at the Institute of Economic and Social Research at Jinan University. His research is focused on parenting and child development, with particular attention on how life cycle decisions of parents interact with parenting decisions. He received B.A. in economics at UC Berkeley and PhD in economic at the University of Chicago.
GLO VirtYS project: Mental Health Consequences of Working from Home during the Pandemic
This paper examines the effects of working from home on mental health, using unique real time survey data from South Korea collected during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that working from home negatively affects the mental health of workers in the first half of 2020. Furthermore, we find substantial heterogeneity across gender and home environment. The negative impact of working from home is concentrated on women, and on those who are primarily responsible for housework while also maintaining market work. Surprisingly, workers who live with children in the household do not suffer from the negative effects of working from home. Our findings suggest that family-work interaction may be an important factor in the optimal design of working from home.
Femke Cnossen is a PhD student at the University of Groningen. Her PhD focuses on the micro-dynamics of technological change and labour markets, by linking survey data to registerdata. She studies skill demand, (routine) task prices, and on the impact of technological progress on meaningfulness of work. From september, she is a postdoctoral researcher in regional skill analysis at the Faculty of Spatial Sciences at the University of Groningen.
GLO VirtYS project: Learning the Right Skill: Revealed Local Labour Demand for Underlying Skills in STEM and Non-STEM Graduates
Technological change and globalization have sparked debates on the changing demand for skills in western labour markets, especially for middle skilled workers who have seen their tasks replaced. This paper provides a new data set, which is based on text data from curricula of the entire Dutch vocational education system. We extract verbs and nouns to measure social, technical and basic skills in a novel way. This method allows us to uncover the skills middle-skilled students learn in school. Using this data, we show that skill returns vary across students specialized in STEM, services or health. Furthermore, we show that social and technical skills differentially relate to the probability of being employed in either the low or high skill sector or in the goods sector. Our findings can guide future research on the complementarity between skills and production technologies.
Interested researchers are cordially invited to submit their abstracts or papers for presentation consideration. The 37th EBES Conference will take place ONLINE ONLY on October 6-8 2021. GLO is a co-organizing partner, and FOM University of Applied Sciences is the local host operating from Berlin.
This is aGLO supported event. EBES, theEurasia Business and Economics Society, and FOM University of Applied Sciencesboth are strategic partners and institutional supporters of GLO. GLO President Klaus F. Zimmermann is also President of EBES.FOM and GLO will organize own sessions for the event.
Authors are invited to submit their abstracts or papers no later than September 17, 2021.
Measuring poverty trends and dynamics is an important undertaking for poverty reduction policies, which is further highlighted by the SDG goal 1 on eradicating poverty by 2030. We provide a broad overview of the pros and cons of poverty imputation in data-scarce environments, update recent review papers, and point to the latest research on the topics. We briefly review two common uses of poverty imputation methods that aim at tracking poverty over time and estimating poverty dynamics. We also discuss new areas for imputation.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper shows that the differences in test scores between big and small cities depend on school characteristics, while the differences between general and vocational schools are mainly explained by family social status.
This study aims to identify the main determinants of student performance in reading and maths across eight European Union countries (Austria, Croatia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Portugal, Slovakia, and Slovenia). Based on student-level data from the OECD’s PISA 2018 survey and by means of the application of efficient algorithms, we highlight that the number of books at home and a variable combining the type and location of their school represent the most important predictors of student performance in all of the analysed countries, while other school characteristics are rarely relevant. Econometric results show that students attending vocational schools perform significantly worse than those in general schools, except in Portugal. Considering only general school students, the differences between big and small cities are not statistically significant, while among students in vocational schools, those in a small city tend to perform better than those in a big city. Through the Gelbach decomposition method, which allows measuring the relative importance of observable characteristics in explaining a gap, we show that the differences in test scores between big and small cities depend on school characteristics, while the differences between general and vocational schools are mainly explained by family social status.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Global Labor Organization (GLO) invites interested young scholars to apply for participation in the 2021-22GLO Virtual Young Scholars Program (GLO VirtYS). This is the third cohort of the successful GLO venture to support career developments of young researchers. It also provides a unique opportunity to interact with the large and very active GLO global network.
A new GLO Discussion Paper highlights social identity as an important determinant of STEM-related education with potential long-term implications for the economic welfare of disadvantaged groups.
In this study, we examine characteristics of employment in FDI in Vietnam. Workers from FDI account for 5.6% of working people. Female and younger people are more likely to work the FDI sector. Compared with private and public sectors, the FDI sector has a lower share of workers who have tertiary education. The FDI sector has a high proportion of workers with social insurance, at 95%. However, there is a relatively large proportion of the FDI workers receiving daily wages and piece payment. The FDI workers have a high number of working hours and more likely to have overtime working hours. The FDI workers have lower wages per hour than those in the private and public sector. However, once observed characteristics of workers are controlled for, the FDI workers have higher hourly and monthly wages than the private as well as public workers. The proportion of FDI workers who moved out of the FDI sector was 11% over a three-month period and 31% over a two-year period. Older workers are more likely to move out of the FDI sector than young ones. There is no evidence that workers move out of the FDI sector after age 35.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper highlights social identity as an important determinant of STEM-related education with potential long-term implications for the economic welfare of disadvantaged groups.
Author Abstract: This paper investigates the role of social identity, namely gender and caste of individuals, in stream choice at the higher secondary level of schooling in India. We analyze the choice of science stream that is a crucial determinant of subsequent science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) related education and labour market outcomes. Using three rounds of nationally representative surveys between 2007 and 2018, we estimate regression models including household characteristics and fixed effects to control for region-specific unobserved heterogeneity. We find that females and individuals belonging to historically disadvantaged social groups (castes) are significantly less likely to study science. On average, female students enrolled in higher secondary education have 9 percentage points lower probability than male students to study science during the period considered for the analysis. For students belonging to the socially disadvantaged groups – Scheduled Tribes (ST), Scheduled Caste (SC), and Other Backward Classes (OBC), the likelihood of studying science is significantly lower by 6.9, 4.4, and 2.7 percentage points, respectively, than students from the less-disadvantaged groups. Using decomposition analysis, we show that the differences in the observable characteristics such as economic affluence and household head’s education significantly explain some portion of the caste-based gaps, but they do not explain the gender gap that persists even in an intra-household comparison. We also test for the intersectionality of the overlapping identities of gender and caste in this context. We find evidence of cumulative disadvantages for females of SC and OBC groups, but lower gender disparity among ST students indicating the presence of intersectionality for this group. Thus, our paper highlights social identity as an important determinant of STEM-related education that may have long-term implications for the economic welfare of disadvantaged groups.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper suggests that composite fuel deprivation indicators may be useful energy policy instruments for uncovering the underlining mechanism via which fuel poverty may get “under the skin”.
Author Abstract: This paper uses data from Understanding Society: the UK Household Longitudinal Study to explore the association between fuel poverty and a set of well-being outcomes: life-satisfaction, self-reported health measures and more objectively measured biomarker data. Over and above the conventional income–fuel cost indicators, we also use more proximal heating deprivation indicators. We create and draw upon a set of composite indicators that concomitantly capture (the lack of) affordability and thermal comfort. Depending on which fuel deprivation indicator is used, we find heterogeneous associations between fuel poverty and our well-being outcomes. Employing combined fuel deprivation indicators, which takes into account the income–fuel cost balance and more proximal perceptions of heating adequacy, reveals the presence of more pronounced associations with life satisfaction and fibrinogen, one of our biological health measures. The presence of these strong associations would have been less pronounced or masked when using separately each of the components of our composite fuel deprivation indicators as well as in the case of self-reported generic measures of physical health. Lifestyle and chronic health conditions plays a limited role in attenuating our results, while material deprivation partially, but not fully, attenuates our associations between fuel deprivation and well-being. These results remain robust when bounding analysis is employed to test the potential confounding role of unobservables. Our analysis suggests that composite fuel deprivation indicators may be useful energy policy instruments for uncovering the underlining mechanism via which fuel poverty may get “under the skin”.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper using meta-regression estimates suggest that the results of the primary literature are not stable across cultures and gender, and that ranking and academic field of the journal matter.
Author Abstract: The past two decades have witnessed an increasing interest in the relationship between personality and labor market outcomes, as well as the emergence of the Five-Factor Model as the reference framework for the study of personality. In this paper, we provide the first meta-analytical review of the empirical literature on the association between personal earnings and the Big Five personality traits. The analysis combines the results of 63 peer-reviewed articles published between 2001-2020, from which we retrieved 896 partial effect sizes. Overall, the primary literature provides robust support for a positive association between personal earnings and the traits of Openness, Conscientiousness, and Extraversion, while simultaneously revealing a negative and significant association between earnings and the traits of Agreeableness and Neuroticism. We find no evidence of a substantial publication bias. Meta-regression estimates suggest that Openness and Conscientiousness are positively associated with earnings even when primary researchers control for individual cognitive abilities and educational attainments. Similarly, the studies that includes labor market control variables exhibit weaker associations between earnings and Extraversion and Agreeableness. The results of the primary studies seem unaffected by the time at which the Big Five are measured, as well as by the scale and number of inventory items. Meta-regression estimates suggest that the results of the primary literature are not stable across cultures and gender, and that the ranking and academic field of the journal matter.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that they do and half of the penalty can be explained by the perception that those applicants who make spelling errors have lower interpersonal skills, conscientiousness and mental abilities.
Author Abstract: Earlier research has associated spelling errors in resumes with reduced hiring chances. However, the analysis of hiring penalties due to spelling errors has thus far been restricted to white-collar occupations and relatively high numbers of errors per resume. Moreover, the mechanisms underlying the spelling error penalty have remained unclear. To fill these gaps in the peerreviewed literature, we conducted a scenario experiment with 445 genuine recruiters. Results show that, compared to error-free resumes, hiring penalties are being inflicted for both error-laden resumes (18.5 percent points lower interview probability) and resumes with fewer errors (7.3 percent points lower interview probability). Furthermore, we find substantial heterogeneity in penalties inflicted based on various applicant, job and participant characteristics. About half of the spelling error penalty can be explained by the perception that applicants who make spelling errors have lower interpersonal skills (9.0%), conscientiousness (12.1%) and mental abilities (32.2%).
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that the correlation between income and satisfaction is greater for the lower-income group (the Roma) than for the higher-income group (majority population).
Author Abstract: This paper utilizes two measures of subjective well-being to test a hypothesis that a marginal increase in subjective well-being associated with a marginal increase in income is larger for poorer than for richer populations. This hypothesis is examined in the setting of Slovak Roma, who are poor in comparison to the non-Roma population. The results suggest that the correlation between income and satisfaction is greater for the lower-income group (the Roma) than for the higher-income group (majority population). Further, the correlation between income and emotional well-being does not differ between the two groups.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: This paper reviews the literature concerning the evolution of cultural traits in general and preferences in particular, and the emergence and persistence of rules or norms, from a family perspective. In models where each person is effectively the clone of an existing one (either a parent or anyone else), there may be evolution only in the demographic sense that the share of the population who hold a certain trait increases or decreases. Evolution in the strict sense of new traits making their appearance occurs in models where the trait characterizing any given member of any given generation is a combination of traits drawn at random from those represented in the previous generation. Preferences may be altruistic or non-altruistic, but individuals may behave as if they were altruistic even if they are not, because a rule or norm may make it in their interest to do so. Evolutionary stability and renegotiation proofness play analogous roles, the former by selecting altruistic preferences, and the latter by selecting cooperation-inducing rules. The existence of population groups recognizable by outward characteristics like ethnicity or religious practice may convey useful information regarding imperfectly observable traits of direct interest to individuals, but it may also lead individuals to judge others by their group membership rather than by their unobservable individual qualities, and thus to see them as possible foes.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper examines an Indian conditional cash transfer program to find an improved sex ratio at birth and better post-birth outcomes like immunization and education.
Author Abstract: Worldwide, 1.6 million girls are “missing” at birth every year. One policy tool to improve the sex ratio is a conditional cash transfer that pays parents to invest in daughters, but existing evidence on their effectiveness is sparse. Using a difference-in-differences framework, we evaluate the Dhanlakshmi scheme, an Indian CCT program that strongly encouraged girl births without restricting fertility. Dhanlakshmi improved the sex ratio at birth, with only a small fertility increase. The girl-birth effect was concentrated among the first two parities and partially persisted after the program was discontinued. Post-birth outcomes like immunization and education also improved.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds based on 85 articles in the literature that retirement affects health positively in 28% of the studies, 13% negatively while the rest are inconclusive.
Author Abstract: This paper presents a meta-analysis on the effects of retirement on health. We select academic papers published between 2000 and 2021 studying the impact of retirement on physical and mental health, self-assessed general health, healthcare utilization and mortality. Among 275 observations from 85 articles, 28% (13%) find positive (negative) effects of retirement on health outcomes. Almost 60% of the observations do not provide statistically significant findings. Using meta-regression analysis, we checked for the presence of publication bias after distinguishing among different journal subject areas and, once correcting for it, we find that the average effect of retirement on health outcomes is small and barely significant. We apply model averaging techniques to explore possible sources of heterogeneity and our results suggest that the different estimated effects can be explained by the differences in both health measurements and retirement schemes.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: This chapter reviews the empirical literature on the impacts of temperature and climate change on human pregnancies. The focus is on the quasi-experimental studies that use panel data, apply a fixed effect approach, and exploit the random year-to-year fluctuation in temperature. The insights that emerge from the review highlight that exposure to heat in the pre-conception period has detrimental impacts on fertility. In addition, heat during pregnancy increases pregnancy losses, leads to a reduction in gestational length, and lowers birth weight. Despite the growing empirical evidence on the subject, understanding the relationship between temperature and pregnancy-related outcomes is far from perfect. Importantly, the potential impacts of climate change are rarely quantified. The chapter outlines directions for future research.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper highlights the relevance of the definition of the dependent variable for inferences and interpretation of studies about the effectiveness of industrial relations institutions and raises questions about the validity of the studied performance measures.
Author Abstract: Recent studies on the economic effects of works councils in Germany using the European Company Survey estimate a significant negative effect of works councils on establishment productivity and profitability. These results are in stark contrast to studies using the IAB Establishment Panel estimating a significant positive effect of works councils on establishment productivity and profitability. This article scrutinises these empirical approaches. While sample selection and control variables have a substantial impact on the magnitude of marginal effects, the definition of the dependent variable as an objective or subjective measure causes the opposing signs. Beyond that, similar measures in both datasets lead to comparable marginal effects highlighting the relevance of the definition of the dependent variable for inferences and interpretation of studies about the effectiveness of industrial relations institutions and raising questions about the validity of the performance measures.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper shows that exposure to the FIFA Soccer World Cups had had a negative impact on male Vietnamese student performance and subsequent labor market success.
Author Abstract: The FIFA Soccer World Cups often happen within one month just before the national entrance exam to universities and colleges in Vietnam. Watching soccer matches can distract male students from their studies and reduce their probability to pass the exam. We find that Vietnamese men who had the university entrance exam during the FIFA Soccer World Cups tend to have a lower proportion of having a bachelor’s degree. Exposure to World Cups also reduces the probability of having a formal job, a high-skilled job and management position for men. Using the exposure to World Cups as a natural shock for tertiary education, we find a large and positive effect of tertiary education on employment. It confirms the important role of education in reducing gender gap in employment.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
2021 Virtual Conference of the International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies ISQOLS 2021 CONFERENCE: “Quality-of-life and Adaptation in a Virulent World” VIRTUAL EVENT: 23-27, AUGUST 2021
The 2021 Virtual Conference of the International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies (ISQOLS 2021) on “Quality-of-life and Adaptation in a Virulent World” takes place on 23-27 August 2021 as a virtual event. The conference features five GLO/EHERO Special Sessions on Happiness Economics put together under the direction of Martijn Hendriks, Martijn Burger, and Milena Nikolova. Milena Nikolova is also the GLO Cluster Lead on Happiness Economics and a Section Editor dealing with happiness economics in the GLO-supported forthcoming Handbook “Labor, Human Resources and Population Economics” edited by GLO President Klaus F. Zimmermann. A number of review papers presented in the GLO/EHERO Special Sessions are articles from this Handbook.
Stephanie Rossouw and Talita Greyling: Big Data and Happiness
Olga Popova and Vladimir Otrachshenko: Religion and happiness
Clemens Hetschko, Andreas Knabe and Ronnie Schöb: Happiness, Work and Identity
Martin Binder and Ann-Kathrin Blankenberg: Self-Employment and Subjective Well-Being
Happiness Economics II: 10.00-11.40
Diana Tam and Arthur Grimes: The Economics of Free Speech: A Subjective Wellbeing Approach
Philip Morrison: Whose happiness in which cities? The urban wellbeing paradox revisited
Martijn Hendriks and Randall Birnberg: Happiness in the daily socio-cultural integration process: A day reconstruction study among US immigrants in Germany
Jeehoon Han and Caspar Kaiser: Changes in Time Use and Happiness
Happiness Economics III: 12.00-13.40
Richard Easterlin and Kelsey O’Connor: The Easterlin Paradox
Alberto Prati and Claudia Senik: Feeling good or feeling better?
Robin Konietzny, Milena Nikolova and Bart Los: Trade and Job (In)Security: The Two Sides of Occupational Import Exposure
Happiness Economics IV: 14.00-15.40
Carol Graham, Emily Dobson and James Kunhardt: When Public Health Crises Become Entwined: How Trends in COVID-19, Deaths of Despair, and Well-being Track Across the U.S.A.
Francesco Sarracino, Kelsey O’Connor, Chiara Peroni, Talita Greyling and Stephanie Rossouw: Well-being expressed through Twitter during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Julia Schmidtke, Clemens Hetschko, Gesine Stephan, Michael Eid, Ronnie Schöb and Mario Lawes: The impact of Covid-19 on mental health and well-being. An event-study based on high-frequency longitudinal survey data
Happiness Economics V: 19.00-20.40
Paul Fenton Villar: Is there a Mineral-Induced ‘Economic Euphoria’?: Evidence from Latin America
Mariano Rojas, Karen Watkins and Lázaro Rodríguez: The Happiness of CEOs in Family and Nonfamily Firms: Different Explanatory Structures and its Consequences
Annie Tubadji: Consumer Happiness and AI Sensitivity to Cultural and Moral Preferences
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds a decreasing trend in subjective poverty in 16 of 28 countries. Conversely, the official relative income poverty indicator exhibits increasing trends in eleven countries, with decreasing trends in only four countries.
Author Abstract: When developing anti-poverty policies, policy makers need accurate data on the prevalence of poverty. In this paper, we focus on subjective poverty, a concept which has been largely neglected in literature, yet remains a conceptually appealing way to define poverty. The primary goal of this study is to re-examine the concept of subjective poverty measurement and to estimate trends in subjective poverty rates in the European Union. Our estimations are based on a minimum income question using data from a representative survey, EU-SILC, and we find a decreasing trend in subjective poverty in 16 of 28 countries. Conversely, the official relative income poverty indicator exhibits increasing trends in eleven countries, with decreasing trends in only four countries. We believe that these trends may reflect changes in societies which have not been previously captured, and our results thus enrich the existing data on general poverty trends in the EU.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that social mobility rates were low during the Communist regime, and did not change measurably during the transition; however, the composition of the political elite changed fast and sharply.
Author Abstract: This paper measures social mobility rates in Hungary 1949-2017, for upper class and underclass families, using surnames to measure social status. In these years there were two very different social regimes. The first was the Hungarian People’s Republic, 1949-1989, a Communist regime with an avowed aim of favouring the working class. Then the modern liberal democracy, 1989-2020, a free-market economy. We find five surprising things. First, social mobility rates were low for both upper- and lower-class families 1949- 2017, with an underlying intergenerational status correlation of 0.6-0.8. Second, social mobility rates under communism were the same as in the subsequent capitalist regime. Third, the Romani minority throughout both periods showed even lower social mobility rates. Fourth, the descendants of the noble class in Hungary in the eighteenth century were still significantly privileged in 1949 and later. And fifth, while social mobility rates did not change measurably during the transition, the composition of the political elite changed fast and sharply.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper evaluate the differential responses of poor households vs. non-poor households to changes in food expenditures and prices and simulate the welfare losses from food price changes across poverty definitions.
Author Abstract: Evidence suggests that household responses to price and income changes are significantly sensitive across income levels and rural-urban location. In this paper, we focus on poor households vs. non-poor households using two definitions of poverty, objective and subjective. We evaluate the differential responses of poor households vs. non-poor households to changes in food expenditures and prices and simulate the welfare losses from food price changes across poverty definitions. We use the QUAIDS model to estimate food elasticities with data from the National Expenditure and Household Income Survey, 2016-2017, from Uruguay. Expenditure elasticities at the food level reveal that bread and dairy products are a necessity-food category, regardless of the poverty status and across poverty definitions, while beverages are a luxury good. The demand sensitivity for the rest of the food categories differs by poverty status and poverty definitions. Uncompensated own-price elasticities indicate that when poverty is defined objectively, then changes in demand due to changes in price are greater for poor households (except for meat products). However, poor households, under the subjective definition, are more sensitive than non-poor households only to changes in beverage prices. Additionally, changes in household economic welfare due to price increases vary according to poverty status. On average, the percentage of total income needed to avoid a loss in economic welfare of poor households, defined by the objective method, is double that required by the non-poor households, for all price changes. However, differences are much smaller when using the subjective approach to measure poverty.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper studies a natural experiment in the US to find that there are relevant effects of in utero exposure to polluted water on health at birth.
Author Abstract: In 2014, the city of Flint, MI in the U.S. changed its public water source, resulting in severe water contamination and a public health crisis. Using the Flint Water Crisis as a natural experiment, we estimate the effect of in utero exposure to polluted water on health at birth. Matching vital statistics birth records with various sources of data, we use a Synthetic Control Method (SCM) to identify the causal impact of water pollution on key birth outcomes. Our results suggest that the crisis modestly increased the rate of low birth weight (LBW) by 1.8 percentage points (or 15.5 percent) but had little effect on the length of gestation or rate of prematurity. However, these effects are larger among children born to black mothers, as indicated by an increase in the rate of LBW by 2.5 percentage points (or 19 percent). Children born to white mothers exhibit, on average, a 30.1-gram decrease in birth weight. We find little evidence that the male-to-female sex ratio declines in the overall population, suggesting that the inutero scarring effect of the Flint Water Crisis may dominate the channel of mortality selection. However, we observe a slight decline in the sex ratio among children born to black mothers. Finally, we find no notable change in the fertility rates of either black women or white women in Flint. These results are robust to a rich set of placebo and falsification tests. Our findings highlight the importance and urgency of upgrading U.S. aging, lead-laced water systems in promoting racial and ethnic health equity.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper suggests that extreme weather conditions, including those associated with climate change, could make children vulnerable to reduced physical activity.
Author Abstract: This study explores the differential impact of weather on time allocation to physical activity and sleep by children and their parents. We use nationally representative data with time use indicators objectively measured on multiple occasions for more than 1,100 child-parent pairs, coupled with daily meteorological data. Employing an individual fixed effects regression model to estimate the causal impact of weather, we find that unfavourable weather conditions, as measured by cold or hot temperatures or rain, cause children to reduce physical activity time and increase sedentary time. However, such weather conditions have little impact on children’s sleep time or the time allocation of their parents. We also find substantial differential weather impact, especially on children’s time allocation, by weekdays/weekends and parental employment status, suggesting that these factors may contribute to explaining the differential weather impact that we observed. Our results additionally provide evidence of adaptation, as temperature appears to have a more pronounced impact on time allocation in colder months and colder regions. The results suggest that extreme weather conditions, including those associated with climate change, could make children vulnerable to reduced physical activity.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Interested researchers are cordially invited to submit their abstracts or papers for presentation consideration. The 37th EBES Conference in Berlin will take place on October 6-8 2021 in Hybrid Mode (online and in-person). GLO is a co-organizing partner, and FOM University of Applied Sciences is the local host.
This is aGLO supported event. EBESis theEurasia Business and Economics Society, a strategic partner and institutional supporter of GLO as well as FOM University of Applied Sciences. GLO President Klaus F. Zimmermann is also President of EBES.FOM and GLO will organize own sessions for the event.
Invited Speakers
EBES is pleased to announce that distinguished colleagues Dorothea Schäfer, Klaus F. Zimmermann and Marco Vivarelli will participate as keynote speakers and/or invited editors.
Dorothea Schäfer is the Research Director of Financial Markets at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) and Adjunct Professor of Jönköping International Business School, Jönköping University. She has also worked as an evaluator for the European Commission, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairwoman of Evaluation Committee for LOEWE (Landes-Offensive zur Entwicklung Wissenschaftlich-ökonomischer Exzellenz des Bundeslandes Hessen). She managed various research projects supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), the EU Commission, the Fritz Thyssen Foundation and the Stiftung Geld und Währung. Her researches were published in various journals such as Journal of Financial Stability; German Economic Review; International Journal of Money and Finance; and Small Business Economics. She is regularly invited as an expert in parliamentary committees, including the Finance Committee of the Bundestag and gives lectures on financial market issues in Germany and abroad. She is also a member of the Editorial Board and Editor-in-Chief of the policy-oriented journal “Vierteljahrshefte zur Wirtschaftsforschung” and Editor-in-Chief of Eurasian Economic Review. Her research topics include financial crisis, financial market regulation, financing constraints, gender, and financial markets, financial transaction tax.
Klaus F. Zimmermann is President of the Global Labor Organization (GLO); Co-Director of POP at UNU-MERIT; Full Professor of Economics at Bonn University (em.); Honorary Professor, Maastricht University, Free University of Berlin and Renmin University of China; Member, German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, Regional Science Academy, and Academia Europaea (Chair of its Section for Economics, Business and Management Sciences). Among others, he has worked at Macquarie University, the Universities of Melbourne, Princeton, Harvard, Munich, Kyoto, Mannheim, Dartmouth College and the University of Pennsylvania. Research Fellow of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and Fellow of the European Economic Association (EEA). Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Population Economics. Editorial Board of International Journal of Manpower, Research in Labor Economics and Comparative Economic Studies, among others. Founding Director, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA); Past-President, German Institute for Economic Research (DIW). Distinguished John G. Diefenbaker Award 1998 of the Canada Council for the Arts; Outstanding Contribution Award 2013 of the European Investment Bank. Rockefeller Foundation Policy Fellow 2017; Eminent Research Scholar Award 2017, Australia; EBES Fellow Award 2018. He has published in many top journals including Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Review, Econometrica, Journal of the European Economic Association, Journal of Human Resources, Journal of Applied Econometrics, Public Choice, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Population Economics and Journal of Public Economics. His research fields are population, labor, development, and migration.
Marco Vivarelli is a full professor at the Catholic University of Milano, where he is also Director of the Institute of Economic Policy. He is Professorial Fellow at UNU-MERIT, Maastricht; Research Fellow at IZA; Fellow of the Global Labor Organization (GLO). He is member of the Scientific Executive Board of the Eurasia Business and Economics Society (EBES); member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO, Vienna) and has been scientific consultant for the International Labour Office (ILO), World Bank (WB), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the European Commission. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Eurasian Business Review, Editor of Small Business Economics, Associate Editor of Industrial and Corporate Change, Associate Editor of Economics EJournal, member of the Editorial Board of Sustainability and he has served as a referee for more than 70 international journals. He is author/editor of various books and his papers have been published in journals such as Cambridge Journal of Economics, Canadian Journal of Economics, Economics Letters, Industrial and Corporate Change, International Journal of Industrial Organization, Journal of Economics, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Journal of Productivity Analysis, Labour Economics, Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Regional Studies, Research Policy, Small Business Economics, Southern Economic Journal, World Bank Research Observer, and World Development. His current research interests include the relationship between innovation, employment, and skills; the labor market and income distribution impacts of globalization; the entry and post-entry performance of newborn firms.
Executive Board
Prof. Klaus F. Zimmermann, UNU-MERIT, Maastricht, and Free University Berlin Prof. Jonathan Batten, University Utara Malaysia, Malaysia Prof. Iftekhar Hasan, Fordham University, U.S.A. Prof. Euston Quah, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore Prof. John Rust, Georgetown University, U.S.A. Prof. Dorothea Schäfer, German Institute for Economic Research DIW Berlin, Germany Prof. Marco Vivarelli, Università Cattolica Del Sacro Cuore, Italy
Abstract/Paper Submission
Authors are invited to submit their abstracts or papers no later than August 20, 2021
General inquiries regarding the call for papers should be directed to ebes@ebesweb.org.
Publication Opportunities
Qualified papers can be published in EBES journals (Eurasian Business Review and Eurasian Economic Review) or EBES proceedings books after a peer review process without any submission or publication fees. EBES journals (EABR and EAER) are published by Springer and both are indexed in the SCOPUS, EBSCO EconLit with Full Text, Google Scholar, ABS Academic Journal Quality Guide, CNKI, EBSCO Business Source, EBSCO Discovery Service, ProQuest International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS), OCLC WorldCat Discovery Service, ProQuest ABI/INFORM, ProQuest Business Premium Collection, ProQuest Central, ProQuest Turkey Database, ProQuest-ExLibris Primo, ProQuest-ExLibris Summon, Research Papers in Economics (RePEc), Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China, Naver, SCImago, ABDC Journal Quality List, Cabell’s Directory, and Ulrich’s Periodicals Directory. In addition, while EAER is indexed in the Emerging Sources Citation Index (Clarivate Analytics), EABR is indexed in the Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) and Current Contents / Social & Behavioral Sciences.
Also, all accepted abstracts will be published electronically in the Conference Program and the Abstract Book (with an ISBN number). It will be distributed to all conference participants at the conference via USB. Although submitting full papers are not required, all the submitted full papers will also be included in the conference proceedings in a USB.
After the conference, participants will also have the opportunity to send their paper to be published (after a refereeing process managed by EBES) in the Springer’s series Eurasian Studies in Business and Economics (no submission and publication fees). This is indexed by Scopus. It will also be sent to Clarivate Analytics in order to be reviewed for coverage in the Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Social Science & Humanities (CPCI-SSH). Please note that the 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th (Vol. 2), 21st, and 24th EBES Conference Proceedings are accepted for inclusion in the Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Social Science & Humanities (CPCI-SSH). Other conference proceedings are in progress.
Important Dates
Conference Date: October 6-8, 2021 Abstract Submission Deadline: August 20, 2021 Reply-by: August 23, 2021* Registration Deadline: August 31, 2021 Submission of the Virtual Presentation: August 31, 2021 Announcement of the Program: September 10, 2021 Paper Submission Deadline (Optional): August 23, 2021** Paper Submission for the EBES journals: November 16, 2021
* The decision regarding the acceptance/rejection of each abstract/paper will be communicated with the corresponding author within a week of submission.
** Completed paper submission is optional. If you want to be considered for the Best Paper Award or your full paper to be included in the conference proceedings in the USB, after submitting your abstract before August 20, 2021, you must also submit your completed (full) paper by August 31, 2021.
Contact
Ugur Can, Director of EBES (ebes@ebesweb.org) Dr. Ender Demir, Conference Coordinator of EBES (demir@ebesweb.org)
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that living in a student room as a tertiary education student in Belgium (instead of commuting between one’s parental residence and college or university) does not affect exam results.
Author Abstract: We study whether living in a student room as a tertiary education student (instead of commuting between one’s parental residence and college or university) affects exam results. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to study this relationship beyond cross-sectional analysis. That is, we exploit rich longitudinal data on 1,653 Belgian freshmen students’ residential status and exam scores to control for observed heterogeneity as well as for individual fixed (or random) effects. We find that after correcting for unobserved heterogeneity, the association found in earlier contributions disappears. This finding of no significant impact of living in a student room on exam results is robust for other methods used for causal inference including instrumental variable techniques.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper confirms that refugees and other migrants are less likely to be employed than natives and the employment gap is much higher for refugees.
Author Abstract: Using the panel data from 1995 to 2019, this paper investigates the labor market integration of non-EU immigrants in Germany. The existing evidence shows that the economic outcomes of migrants are far behind natives. However, immigrants are a heterogeneous group in terms of their motives for migration and skills composition. In this paper, I disentangle immigrants into refugees and other migrants and compare the employment probability gap between refugees, other migrants, and natives. I also examine whether refugees have a lower employment outcome than other migrants and to what extent the level of education, language proficiency, health status, years since migration, and cohort effects explain the employment gap between the refugees and other migrants. The result confirms that refugees and other migrants are less likely to be employed than natives and the employment gap is much higher for refugees. I also find evidence of heterogeneity across gender. Other migrant men do not significantly differ from native men in the probability of being employed. In contrast, refugee women have an economic disadvantage than other migrant women and native women. I find no evidence that health status differences attribute to the employment gap between refugees, other migrants, and natives. Finally, this paper highlights the importance of the migration category when assessing the integration of immigrants into the labor market.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds for South Africa that the highest household income quintiles claim social welfare payments meant for the poor, most likely leading to increased inequality.
Author Abstract: Social welfare payments (SWP) were designed with policy priority to transfer revenue to vulnerable groups, thereby addressing poverty and inequality. Previous studies have shown that SWPs alleviate poverty, but investigating their effect on well-being is sparse. We investigate the relationship between SWPs and the mean subjective well-being (SWB) of a household and analyse it across household income quintiles. We use the National Income Dynamics Study dataset, which is representative of South Africa. South Africa is an example of extremes, as it suffers from poverty, inequality, and low levels of SWB; yet, paradoxically, it has an exemplary social welfare system. We use a range of analytical methods, including ordered probit regressions and a quasi-experimental technique. We find that the highest household income quintiles claim SWPs meant for the poor, most likely leading to increased inequality. Additionally, SWPs are positively related to SWB for quintiles one to four, but the relationship is negative in the highest quintile.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new paper published ONLINE FIRST freely accessible finds that the minimum working age raised from 14 to 16 in Spain, while the compulsory education age remained at 14. The reform decreased mortality at ages 14–29 among men by 6.4% and women by 8.9%, mainly from a reduction in deaths due to traffic accidents. However, the reform also increased mortality for women ages 30–45 by 7%.
by Cristina Bellés-Obrero, Sergi Jiménez-Martín & Judit Vall Castello
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics READLINK: https://rdcu.be/cq2lY
Author Abstract: In 1980, a few years after its democratization process, Spain raised the minimum working age from 14 to 16, while the compulsory education age remained at 14. This reform changed the within-cohort incentives to remain in the educational system. We use a difference-in-differences approach, where our treated and control individuals only differ in their month of birth, to analyze the gender asymmetries in mortality generated by this change. The reform decreased mortality at ages 14–29 among men by 6.4% and women by 8.9%, mainly from a reduction in deaths due to traffic accidents. However, the reform also increased mortality for women ages 30–45 by 7%. This is driven by increases in HIV mortality, as well as by diseases related to the nervous and circulatory systems. We show that women’s health habits deteriorated as a consequence of the reform, while this was not the case for men. The gender differences in the impact of the reform on smoking and drinking should be understood in the context of the gender equalization process that affected women were experiencing when the reform took place. All in all, these patterns help explain the narrowing age gap in life expectancy between women and men in many developed countries while, at the same time, they provide important policy implications for middle-income countries that are undergoing those gender equalization processes right now.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper shows that retirement leads to a statistically significant and sizable increase in the probability of making a residential move or the likelihood of becoming outright homeowners.
Author Abstract: This paper provides the first causal evidence on the impact of retirement on housing choices. Our empirical strategy exploits the discontinuity in the eligibility ages for state pension as an instrument for the endogenous retirement decision and controls for time-invariant individual characteristics. The results show that retirement leads to a statistically significant and sizable increase in the probability of making a residential move or the likelihood of becoming outright homeowners. We also find that individuals downsize both physically and financially and tend to move to better neighbourhoods or closer to the coast upon retirement. We additionally discover that some housing adjustments take place up to 6 years before retirement. Moreover, our results reveal significant heterogeneity in the retirement impact by gender, marital status, education, housing tenue, income and wealth. Within couple households, housing mobility choices are primarily influenced by the wife’s retirement while housing downsizing decisions are only affected by the husband’s retirement. The results suggest that failing to address the endogeneity of retirement often under-states the retirement impact on such housing arrangements.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper evaluates the impact of an economic and financial education program targeted to senior high-school students and finds positive effects.
Author Abstract: Using data from a randomized control trial in Uruguay, we evaluate the impact of an economic and financial education program targeted to senior high-school students. The program is based on an innovative playful approach workshop about monetary policy and financial supervision. We find that the workshop has a positive and significant impact on student knowledge. Our results shed light on the importance of economic and financial education for the youth in developing countries.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: Social distancing measures help contain the spread of COVID-19, but actual compliance has varied substantially across space and time. We ask whether cultural differences underlie this heterogeneity using mobility data across Switzerland between February and December 2020. We find that German-speaking cantons decreased their mobility for non-essential activities significantly less than French-speaking cantons. However, we find no such significant differences for bilingual cantons. Contrary to the evidence in the literature, we find that within the Swiss context, high trusting areas exhibited a smaller decline in mobility. Additionally, cantons supporting a limited role of the state in matters of welfare also experienced a smaller reduction in mobility.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that poverty in Russia has been steadily decreasing, with most of the poor having a transient rather than a chronic nature.
Author Abstract: Hardly any recent study exists that broadly reviews poverty trends over time for Russia. Analyzing the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Surveys between 1994 and 2019, we offer an updated review of poverty trends and dynamics for the country over the past quarter of century. We find that poverty has been steadily decreasing, with most of the poor having a transient rather than a chronic nature. The bottom 20 percent of the income distribution averages an annual growth rate of 5 percent, which compares favorably with that of 3.3 percent for the whole population. Income growth, particularly the shares that are attributed to labor incomes and public transfers, have important roles in reducing poverty. Our findings are relevant to poverty and social protection policies.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new paper published ONLINE FIRST freely accessible finds that the minimum working age raised from 14 to 16 in Spain, while the compulsory education age remained at 14. The reform decreased mortality at ages 14–29 among men by 6.4% and women by 8.9%, mainly from a reduction in deaths due to traffic accidents. However, the reform also increased mortality for women ages 30–45 by 7%.
by Cristina Bellés-Obrero, Sergi Jiménez-Martín & Judit Vall Castello
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics READLINK: https://rdcu.be/cq2lY
Author Abstract: In 1980, a few years after its democratization process, Spain raised the minimum working age from 14 to 16, while the compulsory education age remained at 14. This reform changed the within-cohort incentives to remain in the educational system. We use a difference-in-differences approach, where our treated and control individuals only differ in their month of birth, to analyze the gender asymmetries in mortality generated by this change. The reform decreased mortality at ages 14–29 among men by 6.4% and women by 8.9%, mainly from a reduction in deaths due to traffic accidents. However, the reform also increased mortality for women ages 30–45 by 7%. This is driven by increases in HIV mortality, as well as by diseases related to the nervous and circulatory systems. We show that women’s health habits deteriorated as a consequence of the reform, while this was not the case for men. The gender differences in the impact of the reform on smoking and drinking should be understood in the context of the gender equalization process that affected women were experiencing when the reform took place. All in all, these patterns help explain the narrowing age gap in life expectancy between women and men in many developed countries while, at the same time, they provide important policy implications for middle-income countries that are undergoing those gender equalization processes right now.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper using data of Belgian students finds no statistically significant mediating effect of sleep quality in the relationship between smartphone use and academic performance.
Author Abstract: University students’ smartphone use has recently been shown to negatively affect their academic performance. Surprisingly, research testing the empirical validity of potential mechanisms underlying this relationship is very limited. In particular, indirect effects of negative health consequences due to heavy smartphone use have never been investigated. To fill this gap, we investigate, for the first time, whether deteriorated sleep quality drives the negative impact on academic performance. To this end, we examine longitudinal data on 1,635 students at two major Belgian universities. Based on a combination of a random effects approach and seemingly unrelated regression, we find no statistically significant mediating effect of sleep quality in the relationship between smartphone use and academic performance.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new paper published ONLINE FIRST freely accessible finds that immigration from low-income countries reduces intergenerational mobility and thus steepens the social gradient in natives’ labor market outcomes, whereas immigration from high-income countries levels it.
Author Abstract: We examine how immigration affects natives’ relative prime-age labor market outcomes by economic class background, with class background established on the basis of parents’ earnings rank. Exploiting alternative sources of variation in immigration patterns across time and space, we find that immigration from low-income countries reduces intergenerational mobility and thus steepens the social gradient in natives’ labor market outcomes, whereas immigration from high-income countries levels it. These findings are robust with respect to a wide range of identifying assumptions. The analysis is based on high-quality population-wide administrative data from Norway, which is one of the rich-world countries with the most rapid rise in the immigrant population share over the past two decades. Our findings suggest that immigration can explain a considerable part of the observed relative decline in economic performance among natives with a lower-class background.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper studies the impact of the European Medicines Agency’s 2021 March 18th statement assuring the public of the safety of Vaxzevria and the immediate reinstatement of the vaccine by most countries to find that survey respondents’ intention to get vaccinated substantially restored.
Author Abstract: Over the first half of March 2021, the majority of European governments suspended Astrazeneca’s Vaxzevria vaccine as a precaution following media reports of rare blood clots. We analyse the impact of the European Medicines Agency’s (EMA) March 18th statement assuring the public of the safety of Vaxzevria and the immediate reinstatement of the vaccine by most countries on respondents’ intention to get vaccinated. By relying on survey data collected in Luxembourg and neighbouring areas between early March and mid-April, we observe that the willingness to be vaccinated was severely declining in the days preceding the EMA statement. We implement a regression discontinuity design exploiting the time at which respondents completed the survey and find that the vaccine reinstatement substantially restored vaccination intentions.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new paper published ONLINE FIRST freely accessible examines the robustness of the optimal lockdown strategy to the postulated social welfare criterion.
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics FREE READLINK: https://rdcu.be/cpRlF
Pierre Pestieau
Grégory Ponthière
Author Abstract: This paper examines the robustness of the optimal lockdown strategy to the postulated social welfare criterion. We show that utilitarianism can, under some conditions, imply a COVID-19 variant of Parfit’s (1984) Repugnant Conclusion: for any (interior) lockdown with life periods of low quality, there must be a stricter lockdown that is regarded as better, even though this reduces the quality of life periods even more. On the contrary, the ex post egalitarian criterion (giving priority to the worst-off ex post) implies zero lockdown. Varying between its minimal and its maximal levels, the optimal lockdown is not robust to the postulated ethical criterion. We also identify a general ethical dilemma between the goal of saving lives (modeled by the Survivors Number Count axiom) and the goal of giving priority to the worst-off (Hammond Equity).
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that a poverty-reducing effect of collective bargaining institutions stems from the political strength of trade unions in promoting public social spending rather than from any direct effect on earnings inequalities.
Author Abstract: Although many studies point to the significant influence of collective bargaining institutions on earnings inequalities, evidence on how these institutions shape poverty rates across developed economies remains surprisingly scarce. It would be a mistake, though, to believe that the relationship between earnings inequalities and poverty is straightforward. Indeed, whereas earnings inequalities are measured at the individual level, poverty is calculated at the household level using equivalised (disposable) incomes. Accordingly, in most developed countries poverty is not primarily an issue of the working poor. This paper explicitly addresses the relationship between collective bargaining systems and working-age poverty rates in 24 developed countries over the period 1990-2015. Using an up-to-date and fine-grained taxonomy of bargaining systems and relying on state-of-the-art panel data estimation techniques, we find that countries with more centralised and/or coordinated bargaining systems display significantly lower working-age poverty rates than countries with largely or fully decentralised systems. However, this result only holds in a post-tax benefit scenario. Controlling for country-fixed effects and endogeneity, our estimates indeed suggest that the poverty-reducing effect of collective bargaining institutions stems from the political strength of trade unions in promoting public social spending rather than from any direct effect on earnings inequalities.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Author Abstract: Elections define representative democracies, but also produce spikes in physical mobility if voters need to travel to electoral rooms. In this paper, we examine whether large-scale, in-person elections propagate the spread of COVID-19. We exploit a natural experiment from the Czech Republic which biannually renews mandates in 1/3 of Senate constituencies rotating according to the 1995 election law. We show that in the second and third weeks after the 2020 elections (held on October 9-10), new COVID-19 infections grow significantly faster in voting compared to non-voting constituencies. A temporarily-related peak in hospital admissions and essentially no changes in test positivity rates suggest that the acceleration is not merely due to increased testing. The acceleration is absent in population above 65, consistently with strategic risk-avoidance by older voters. Our results have implications for postal voting reforms or postponing of large-scale, in-person (electoral) events during viral outbreaks.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
The meta-analysis provided in a new paper published ONLINE FIRST freely accessible finds that gay men earned less than heterosexual men; lesbian women earned more than heterosexual women, while bisexual men earned less than heterosexual men.
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics FREE READLINK: https://rdcu.be/cpeNT
Nick Drydakis
Author Abstract: This meta-analysis utilizes 24 papers published between 2012-2020 that focus on earnings differences by sexual orientation. The papers cover the period between 1991 and 2018, and countries in Europe, North America and Australia. The meta-analysis indicates that gay men earned less than heterosexual men. Lesbian women earned more than heterosexual women, while bisexual men earned less than heterosexual men. Bisexual women earned less than heterosexual women. According to the meta-analysis, in data sets after 2010, gay men and bisexual men and women continue to experience earnings penalties, while lesbian women continue to experience earnings premiums. Τhe meta-regression estimates indicate relationships between study characteristics and the estimated earnings effects for sexual minorities. For instance, regions, sexual minority data set sizes, and earnings classifications influence the outcomes. The persistence of earnings penalties for gay men and bisexual men and women in the face of anti-discrimination policies represents a cause for concern and indicates the need for comprehensive legislation and workplace guidelines to guarantee that people receive fair pay and not experience any form of workplace inequality simply because of their sexual orientation.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
Norway extended to workers the right to self-certify sickness absence from work. A new paper published ONLINE FIRST OPEN ACCESS in the Journal of Population Economics rules out large absence increases after the reform but provides evidence that the policy change caused a reduction in absence for female workers.
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics OPEN ACCESS: PDF
Author Abstract: This paper examines the impact of a policy reform in a municipality in Norway that extended to workers the right to self-certify sickness absence from work. After the reform, workers were no longer obliged to obtain a certificate from a physician to receive sickness benefits. They could call in sick directly to their line leader and had to engage in a counselling program organized by the employer. To estimate the effect of this reform, we contrast the change in sickness absence among employees who were granted the extended right to self-certify absence with absence among employees who had to obtain a physician’s certificate to be entitled to sickness benefits. We use both a standard difference-in-differences method and the synthetic control method to estimate the effect of the reform. We can rule out large positive effects on absence after the reform, with strong evidence that the policy change actually resulted in a reduction in absence for female workers.
The Global Labor Organization (GLO) is an independent, non-partisan and non-governmental organization that functions as an international network and virtual platform to stimulate global research, debate and collaboration.
A new paper published ONLINE FIRST OPEN ACCESS in the Journal of Population Economics presents evidence to support the hypothesis that personal growth and life appreciation emerge after traumatic events, thereby leading to optimistic perceptions of longevity.
by Bruno Arpino, Pierluigi Conzo & Francesco Salustri
Published ONLINE FIRST 2021: Journal of Population Economics OPEN ACCESS: PDF
Author Abstract: Life-course studies have shown that early-life conditions predict health and socio-economic status in adult life. This study analyzes whether experiencing a traumatic event in childhood, i.e., the Second World War (WW2), affects subjective survival probabilities (SSPs). We rely on a representative sample of European adults who were differentially exposed to WW2 during childhood as a result of their date and place of birth. Results show that exposure to WW2 increases SSPs, with socio-economic and health characteristics not playing a mediating role. War exposure also counterbalances the adverse effects of health impairments on SSPs, but it does not affect health outcomes per se. This fact, jointly with low mortality rates of the cohort under investigation, suggests that selective mortality and post-traumatic stress are not the main channels. Instead, the results support the hypothesis that personal growth and life appreciation emerge after traumatic events, thereby leading to optimistic perceptions of longevity.
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