Insider Privatization and Careers - a Study of a Russian Firm in Transition

Abstract

We study how transition has affected human resource policies of a Russian heavy industry firm. Our data set contains personnel files of 1538 white-collar workers over 17 years: from 1984 to 2000. We find career paths before the first year of Gaidar's reforms, 1992, when Russian transition to a market economy began. After 1992, promotions are blocked, because both (i) more managers are hired from the outside, and (ii) fewer managers leave the firm. A possible reason is an extremely weak outsider property rights enforcement in Russia. Keywords: institutional environment and internal labor market, transition to a market economy.