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Do wages rise with job seniority? A reassessment

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Author Info
Joseph G. Altonji
Nicolas Williams

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Abstract

The authors provide new estimates of the return to job seniority using a dataset similar to that employed in Joseph Altonji and Robert Shakotko, "Do Wages Rise with Job Seniority?" Review of Economic Studies (1987) and Robert Topel, "Specific Capital, Mobility, and Wages," Journal of Political Economy (1991). They consider the strengths and weaknesses of these studies' treatment of economy-wide trends, their dating conventions for tenure and wages, their handling of wage observations that might span multiple jobs, and their estimation approaches. Re-estimation points to an effect of ten years of tenure on the log wage equal to .11, which is above the preferred estimate of Altonji and Shakotko but far below that of Topel. Changes in earnings distributions and in the employment relationship motivate the examination of more recent data. Perhaps surprisingly, the return to tenure has probably increased over time. (Free full-text download available at http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/ilrreview/.)

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Publisher Info
Article provided by ILR Review, ILR School, Cornell University in its journal ILR Review.

Volume (Year): 58 (2005)
Issue (Month): 3 (April)
Pages: 370-397
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Handle: RePEc:ilr:articl:v:58:y:2005:i:3:p:370-397

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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Brown, James N & Light, Audrey, 1992. "Interpreting Panel Data on Job Tenure," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 10(3), pages 219-57, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Marshall, Robert C & Zarkin, Gary A, 1987. "The Effect of Job Tenure on Wage Offers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 5(3), pages 301-24, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Jacob Mincer & Boyan Jovanovic, 1982. "Labor Mobility and Wages," NBER Working Papers 0357, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Carmichael, H Lorne, 1989. "Self-Enforcing Contracts, Shirking, and Life Cycle Incentives," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 65-83, Fall. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Addison, John T & Portugal, Pedro, 1989. "Job Displacement, Relative Wage Changes, and Duration of Unemployment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 7(3), pages 281-302, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Sean Becketti & William Gould & Lee Lillard & Finis Welch, 1985. "The Panel Study of Income Dynamics After Fourteen Years: An Evaluation," UCLA Economics Working Papers 361, UCLA Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  8. Bishop, John H, 1990. "Job Performance, Turnover, and Wage Growth," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 8(3), pages 363-86, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Louis S. Jacobson & Robert J. LaLonde & Daniel Sullivan, 1992. "Earnings Losses of Displaced Workers," Staff Working Papers 92-11, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Katharine G. Abraham & Henry S. Farber, 1987. "Job Duration, Seniority, and Earnings," NBER Working Papers 1819, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  11. Neal, Derek, 1995. "Industry-Specific Human Capital: Evidence from Displaced Workers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 13(4), pages 653-77, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Groshen, Erica L, 1991. "Sources of Intra-industry Wage Dispersion: How Much Do Employers Matter?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 106(3), pages 869-84, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. John M. Abowd & Francis Kramarz & David N. Margolis, 1994. "High Wage Workers and High Wage Firms," NBER Working Papers 4917, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. Topel, Robert, 1990. "Specific capital and unemployment: Measuring the costs and consequences of job loss," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 181-214, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. J. Fitzgerald & P. Gottschalk & R. Moffitt, . "An Analysis of Sample Attrition in Panel Data: The Michigan Panel Study of Income Dynamics," Institute for Research on Poverty Discussion Papers 1156-98, University of Wisconsin Institute for Research on Poverty. [Downloadable!]
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  16. Becketti, Sean, et al, 1988. "The Panel Study of Income Dynamics after Fourteen Years: An Evaluatio n," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(4), pages 472-92, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Altonji, Joseph G & Shakotko, Robert A, 1987. "Do Wages Rise with Job Seniority?," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 54(3), pages 437-59, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Johnson, William R, 1978. "A Theory of Job Shopping," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 92(2), pages 261-78, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  19. Kletzer, Lori Gladstein, 1989. "Returns to Seniority after Permanent Job Loss," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(3), pages 536-43, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  20. Hamermesh, Daniel S, 1987. "The Costs of Worker Displacement," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 102(1), pages 51-75, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  21. Jovanovic, Boyan, 1979. "Job Matching and the Theory of Turnover," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(5), pages 972-90, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  22. Topel, Robert H, 1991. "Specific Capital, Mobility, and Wages: Wages Rise with Job Seniority," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(1), pages 145-76, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  23. Hutchens, Robert M, 1989. "Seniority, Wages and Productivity: A Turbulent Decade," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 49-64, Fall. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  24. Felli, Leonardo & Harris, Christopher, 1996. "Learning, Wage Dynamics, and Firm-Specific Human Capital," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(4), pages 838-68, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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