We examine whether women's rising labor force participation led to increased intergenerational transmission of occupation from fathers to daughters. We develop a model where fathers invest in human capital that is specific to their own occupations. Our model generates an empirical test where we compare the trends in the probabilities that women…

We employ Chinese population census data to consider married, urban women's labor force participation decisions in the context of their families. We find that the presence in the household of a parent, parent-in-law, or person aged 75 or older increases prime-age women's likelihood of participating in market work. The presence of preschool-aged…

This paper analyzes a puzzling aspect of retirement behavior known as "unretirement." Nearly 50 percent of retirees follow a nontraditional retirement path that involves partial retirement or unretirement, and at least 26 percent of retirees later unretire. I explore two possible explanations: (1) unretirement transitions result from failures in…

This study documents the rapid growth in home-based wage and salary employment and the sharp decline in the home-based wage penalty in the United States between 1980 and 2000. These twin patterns, observed for both men and women in most occupation groups, suggest that employer costs of providing home-based work arrangements have decreased.…

Are highly educated workers better at locating in areas with high labor demand? To answer this question, I use three decades of U.S. Census data to estimate a McFadden-style model of residential location choice. I test for education differentials in the likelihood that young workers reside in states experiencing positive labor demand shocks at the…

OLS may understate the effect of unemployment on crime because of the endogeneity problem (Raphael and Winter-Ember 2001). In this paper, we use changes in the real exchange rate, state manufacturing sector percentages, and state union membership rates as novel instrumental variables to carry out 2SLS estimations. We find a one-percentage-point…

After a long decline, the Labor Force Participation Rate (LFPR) of older men in the United States leveled off in the 1980s, and began to increase in the late 1990s. We examine how changes in Social Security rules affected these trends. We attribute only a small portion of the decline from the 1960s-80s to the increasing generosity of Social…

Using 1980/81 and 1990/91 census data from Australia, Canada, and the United States, we estimate the effects of time in the destination country on male immigrants' wages, employment, and earnings. We find that total earnings assimilation is greatest in the United States and least in Australia. Employment assimilation explains all of the earnings…

Work attachment of men aged 58-63 fell dramatically from 1969-89, with a sharp reduction at age 62 that is probably due to Social Security's early retirement provision. Nonpension income and the interaction between private pensions, personal assets, and Social Security may also play a large role. (SK)

The business cycle has a strong impact on calculated rates of return to schooling. Cross-sectional rates of return are positively related to the unemployment rate in the year the cross-section is taken. The sensitivity of the relationship was not found to be substantially different among the races. (CT)

Demographic differences in patterns of employment variation over the business cycle are examined. It is concluded that (1) both participation and unemployment must be considered in any analysis of cyclical changes in the labor market and (2) young people bear a disproportionate share of cyclical employment variation. (Author/CT)

We examine gender wage disparities for four groups of college-educated women--black, Hispanic, Asian, and non-Hispanic white--using the National Survey of College Graduates. Raw log wage gaps, relative to non-Hispanic white male counterparts, generally exceed -0.30. Estimated gaps decline to between -0.08 and -0.19 in nonparametric analyses that…

This article presents an empirical analysis of self-reported reservation wages for unemployed young Black and White males. Results show that young Blacks seek wages that are comparable to those of young Whites in absolute terms but that are higher relative to what is available on the demand side of the market. (Author/CT)

Data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (1967-87) revealed little change in persistence of female labor supply because women have tended to become continuous workers, replacing continuous nonworkers. Periods of reduced hours are now less prolonged among older women. Employment patterns now appear to develop before marriage. (SK)

Job searches by both the unemployed and employed jobseekers are studied through an empirical structural job search model using a choice variable of search intensity. The resulting influence of search intensity on the labor market transitions is analyzed to give the estimation results of the search and the impact of the benefit level on the search…