Empirical Economics最新文献

This paper introduces a threshold mixed data sampling logit (TM-logit) model, which allows for a threshold effect of independent variables sampled at different frequencies on the log-odds of dependent variable. We propose model estimation procedure and develop test statistics for relevance of high-frequency predictors, threshold effect, and equal weighting scheme. We also suggest a test statistic for the difference in forecasting accuracy between two competing models. We then extend the model to the framework with a covariate-dependent threshold (CDTM-logit) and propose estimation procedure and test statistic for threshold constancy. Monte Carlo simulations are conducted to assess the finite sample performance of the proposed estimation procedure and test statistics. The simulation results show that the estimation procedure performs well and test statistics have good size and power properties in finite samples. We apply the proposed model to predict US bank failures, and the empirical results indicate that the TM-logit and CDTM-logit models have good forecasting performance.

We investigate the role of local amenities in shaping compensating wage differentials in labor market populated by high-skilled workers. Using 10 years of longitudinal data on workers productivity along with information on firms and location amenities, we evaluate whether workers are willing to pay to join a better firm and if firms with undesirable attributes must provide higher wages to attract workers. By accounting for unobserved workers heterogeneity, we show that superstars receive positive wage differentials for lower location amenities as well as riskier employments.

We provide new evidence on the economic and health impacts of government- mandated non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Apart from labor force participation, unemployment, and hours worked, we provide novel results on work absence due to illness. We also examine the heterogeneity of these results by demographic and employment groups. We use recent innovations in the difference-in-differences methodology to capture the dynamic effects of these orders that were staggered in nature. Our findings show that states’ social distancing measures increased unemployment and lowered labor market participation and hours worked. The adverse labor market effects were more pronounced for single parents and those working non-teleworkable jobs. We find some evidence that workers’ health improved as absence from work due to illness significantly decreased, suggesting that NPIs protected many vulnerable workers.

This paper provides the first estimates of intergenerational earnings mobility in Chile using administrative data linking parents’ and children’s earnings from the formal private sector. We calculate mobility measures across the earnings distribution, revealing high mobility in the bottom 80% and 65% of the parents’ and children’s distribution, respectively. However, we observe significant persistence in the upper tail of the earnings distribution. Additionally, we identify notable gender heterogeneities in these mobility patterns. Specifically, the intergenerational mobility gender gap shows a nonlinear relationship with respect to parental earnings. Furthermore, we find that differences in mobility between the upper tail of the earnings distribution and the rest of the population are more pronounced for daughters than for sons. These findings suggest that the dynamics of gender-based mobility at the upper tail of the earnings distribution differ from those observed in the rest of the population.

This article revisits the paper “The Historical State, Local Collective Action, and Economic Development in Vietnam” written by Dell, Lane, and Querubin in 2018. The 2018 paper investigates the role of historical state on long-run economic performance in Vietnam. The authors use a historical border in Vietnam, which was in place following the 1698 event and separated two regions: Dai Viet to the north and Khmer to the south. With distinct institutional characteristics on the two border sides, the historical division is said to lead to persistent differences in economic and social outcomes. This article disputes some aspects of the core assumption in their analysis, including the shape and dynamics of the 1698 border, and replicates the statistical outcomes. Results suggest that historical state plays little to no role in determining the social and economic differences among the observations.

This paper aims to evaluate how changing patterns of sectoral gender segregation play a role in accounting for women’s employment contracts and wages in the UK between 2005 and 2020. We then study wage differentials in gender-specific dominated sectors. We found that the propensity of women to be distributed differently across sectors is a major factor contributing to explaining the differences in wages and contract opportunities. Hence, the disproportion of women in female-dominated sectors implies contractual features and lower wages typical of that sector, on average, for all workers. This difference is primarily explained by “persistent discriminatory constraints”, while human capital-related characteristics play a minor role. However, wage differentials would shrink if workers had the same potential and residual wages as men in male-dominated sectors. Moreover, this does not happen at the top of the wage distribution, where wage differentials among women working in female-dominated sectors are always more pronounced than those among men.

In this paper, we provide an assessment of the evolution of markups in Italy in the last twenty years. To this aim, we resort to both macro- and micro-data and estimation techniques, namely reduced forms accounting measures (price–cost margins) and production function model-based indicators. When using aggregate data, we present a comparative study with respect to the other main Euro area countries, whereas the micro-level analysis focuses on the markup dynamics across and within Italian firms. According to our findings, (i) aggregate markups show flat/slightly decreasing dynamics across EU countries, settling to a 1.1 level on average; (ii) the aggregate dynamics hide substantial cross-sector and cross-firm heterogeneity; (iii) the within-firm component is the most relevant driver of markup dynamics; and (iv) no superstars-driven dynamics emerge: although firms with higher markups show slightly more variation over time, there is no evidence of an increasing trend. Finally, we compare our results with those obtained by De Loecker and Eeckhout (Global market power, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, 2018) and show that they differ mainly because our sample, including non-listed firms, is more representative of the EU corporate sectors. Our study has important policy implications: it warns against blindly extending the conclusions valid for specific contexts to others with different characteristics, while inviting a careful assessment of the actual competitive landscape, based on representative datasets and robust analyses.

Educational hypogamy—the practice of men marrying women who are more educated than themselves—has been increasing in rural India over the last two decades. Can this explain rural India’s declining female labor force participation rate (FLFPR)? We examine this question by testing whether women in hypogamous marriages are less likely to participate in the labor force than women in non-hypogamous marriages in rural India. This could be the case since women in hypogamous marriages are viewed as ‘gender norm deviant’ which is likely to cause their marriage quality to be worse than that of women in non-hypogamous marriages. This might make participation in labor force costlier for the former than the latter. To estimate the causal relationship between hypogamy and women’s labor force participation, we employ a nonparametric bounds approach. We find that, indeed, compared to women in non-hypogamous marriages, women in hypogamous marriages are significantly less likely to participate in the labor force. Further, we provide suggestive evidence that this is likely because marriage quality of women in hypogamous marriages is relatively worse. Overall, therefore, our results suggest the rise in hypogamy is likely an important reason for the decline in FLFPR in rural India.