IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/1972.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Ability Biased Technological Transition, Wage Inequality and Growth

Author

Listed:
  • Galor, Oded
  • Moav, Omer

Abstract

This paper develops a growth model in which the endogenous evolution of technological progress and wage inequality is consistent with the observed pattern in the United States and several European economies in the last two centuries. The model accounts for: a) the rise in wage inequality between and within groups of skilled and unskilled workers, the increase in the average wage of skilled workers despite the increase in supply, and the decline in the average wage of unskilled workers, as observed during the 1980s and 1990s; b) the rise in wage inequality within groups and the decline in wage inequality between groups during the 1970s; c) the cyclical evolution of the wage differential between skilled and unskilled workers in the last centuries; and d) the productivity slowdown.

Suggested Citation

  • Galor, Oded & Moav, Omer, 1998. "Ability Biased Technological Transition, Wage Inequality and Growth," CEPR Discussion Papers 1972, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:1972
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=1972
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Neves Sequeira Tiago & Reis Ana B, 2006. "Human Capital Composition, R&D and the Increasing Role of Services," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 6(1), pages 1-25, June.
    2. Jürgen Meckl & Stefan Zink, 2004. "Solow and heterogeneous labour: a neoclassical explanation of wage inequality," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(498), pages 825-843, October.
    3. Chen, Xi & Funke, Michael, 2013. "The dynamics of catch-up and skill and technology upgrading in China," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 38(PB), pages 465-480.
    4. Benabou, Roland, 2005. "Inequality, Technology and the Social Contract," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 25, pages 1595-1638, Elsevier.
    5. Robbins, Donald J., 2003. "The impact of trade liberalization upon inequality in developing countries : a review of theory and evidence," ILO Working Papers 993650553402676, International Labour Organization.
    6. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2004. "From Physical to Human Capital Accumulation: Inequality and the Process of Development," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 71(4), pages 1001-1026.
    7. Agénor, Pierre-Richard & Canuto, Otaviano, 2015. "Middle-income growth traps," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(4), pages 641-660.
    8. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2006. "Das Human-Kapital: A Theory of the Demise of the Class Structure," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 73(1), pages 85-117.
    9. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2002. "Natural Selection and the Origin of Economic Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(4), pages 1133-1191.
    10. Broadberry, Stephen & Ghosal, Sayantan & Proto, Eugenio, 2011. "Is Anonymity the Missing Link Between Commercial and Industrial Revolution?," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 974, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    11. Maoz, Yishay D & Moav, Omer, 1999. "Intergenerational Mobility and the Process of Development," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(458), pages 677-697, October.
    12. Joseph K. Kaboski, 2009. "Education, Sectoral Composition and Growth," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(1), pages 168-182, January.
    13. Atsushi Miyake & Kazunobu Muro & Tamotsu Nakamura & Masaya Yasuoka, 2009. "Between- and within-group wage inequalities, and the advent of new technology," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 7(4), pages 387-394, December.
    14. Catia Batista, 2007. "Joining the EU: Capital Flows, Migration and Wages," Economics Series Working Papers 342, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    15. Hidalgo-Cabrillana, Ana, 2004. "Does asymmetric information promote talented people?," UC3M Working papers. Economics we042809, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.
    16. Matteo Cervellati & Uwe Sunde, 2005. "Human Capital Formation, Life Expectancy, and the Process of Development," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(5), pages 1653-1672, December.
    17. repec:ilo:ilowps:365055 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Alexandra M. de Pleijt, 2011. "The Role of Human Capital in the Process of Economic Development: The Case of England, 1307-1900," Working Papers 0021, Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History.
    19. Acemoglu, Daron & Aghion, Philippe & Violante, Giovanni L., 2001. "Deunionization, technical change and inequality," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 229-264, December.
    20. Cecilia Garcia-Penalosa & Eve Caroli & Philippe Aghion, 1999. "Inequality and Economic Growth: The Perspective of the New Growth Theories," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1615-1660, December.
    21. repec:zbw:bofitp:2012_013 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Rikke Ibsen & Elisabetta Trevisan & Niels Westergaard-Nielsen, 2008. "Job Mobility and Skill Transferability. Some Evidences from Denmark and a Large Italian Region," Working Papers 2008_40, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    23. Saint-Paul, Gilles, 2007. "Knowledge hierarchies in the labor market," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 137(1), pages 104-126, November.
    24. Areendam Chanda & Carl-Johan Dalgaard, 2005. "Wage Inequality and the Rise of Services," DEGIT Conference Papers c010_016, DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Growth; productivity slowdown; Technological Change; Wage Inequality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O40 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:1972. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.