IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/3207.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Human Capital Responses to Technological Change in the Labor Market

Author

Listed:
  • Jacob Mincer

Abstract

In a broad sense, the relation of human capital to economic growth is reciprocal. This study focuses more narrowly on labor market consequences of human capital adjustments to the pace of technological change. Using Jorgensons multifactor productivity growth indexes for industrial sectors in the 1960's and 1970's the study explores effects of differential pace of technological changes on industry demands for educated and trained workers as reflected in PSID data covering the 1968 to 1983 period. The findings show relative increases both in quantity demanded (utilization) and in price (wages) of skilled workers in the more progressive sectors. Steeper wage profiles, lesser turnover, and lesser unemployment characterize labor in sectors whose productivity grew faster in preceding years. The growth of sectoral capital intensity produces similar effects. But, as newer vintages of capital contain new technology, the skill bias of capital intensity partly reflects the skill bias of technology.

Suggested Citation

  • Jacob Mincer, 1989. "Human Capital Responses to Technological Change in the Labor Market," NBER Working Papers 3207, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:3207
    Note: LS
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w3207.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mincer, Jacob, 1984. "Human capital and economic growth," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 3(3), pages 195-205, June.
    2. Zvi Griliches, 1998. "Interindustry Technology Flows and Productivity Growth: A Reexamination," NBER Chapters, in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 241-250, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Schultz, Theodore W, 1975. "The Value of the Ability to Deal with Disequilibria," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 827-846, September.
    4. Bartel, Ann P & Lichtenberg, Frank R, 1987. "The Comparative Advantage of Educated Workers in Implementing New Technology," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 69(1), pages 1-11, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mateos-Planas, Xavier, 2000. "Schooling and distortions in a vintage capital model," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 30, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    2. Galor, Oded & Tsiddon, Daniel, 1997. "The Distribution of Human Capital and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 93-124, March.
    3. Chapman, Bruce, 2006. "Income Contingent Loans for Higher Education: International Reforms," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & F. Welch (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 25, pages 1435-1503, Elsevier.
    4. Riddell, W. Craig & Song, Xueda, 2009. "The Causal Effects of Education on Adaptability," CLSSRN working papers clsrn_admin-2009-15, Vancouver School of Economics, revised 16 Feb 2009.
    5. Zon, Adriaan van & Antonietti, Roberto, 2005. "Education and Training in a Model of Endogenous Growth with Creative Destruction," Research Memorandum 010, Maastricht University, Maastricht Economic Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    6. Mateos-Planas, Xavier, 2000. "Schooling and distortions in a vintage capital model," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 0030, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    7. Adriaan van Zon & Robert Antonietti, 2004. "On the Role of Education and Training as Drivers of Growth," DEGIT Conference Papers c009_027, DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade.
    8. Allen, Steven G, 2001. "Technology and the Wage Structure," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 19(2), pages 440-483, April.
    9. Székely, Miguel & Birdsall, Nancy & Behrman, Jere R., 2000. "Economics Reform and Wage Differentials in Latin America," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 1332, Inter-American Development Bank.
    10. Adrien Montalbo, 2019. "Education and economic development. The influence of primary schooling on municipalities in nineteenth-century France," Working Papers halshs-02286126, HAL.
    11. Hanushek, Eric A. & Schwerdt, Guido & Wiederhold, Simon & Woessmann, Ludger, 2017. "Coping with change: International differences in the returns to skills," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 15-19.
    12. Adrien Montalbo, 2020. "Education supply and economic growth in nineteenth-century France," Working Papers halshs-02482643, HAL.
    13. Galor, Oded & Tsiddon, Daniel, 1997. "Technological Progress, Mobility, and Economic Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(3), pages 363-382, June.
    14. Becker, Sascha O. & Hornung, Erik & Woessmann, Ludger, 2009. "Catch Me If You Can: Education and Catch-up in the Industrial Revolution," IZA Discussion Papers 4556, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Foster, Andrew D & Rosenzweig, Mark R, 1996. "Technical Change and Human-Capital Returns and Investments: Evidence from the Green Revolution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(4), pages 931-953, September.
    16. Paul Beaudry & David A. Green & Benjamin M. Sand, 2016. "The Great Reversal in the Demand for Skill and Cognitive Tasks," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(S1), pages 199-247.
    17. Tan, Hong & Savchenko, Yevgeniya & Gimpelson, Vladimir & Kapeliushnikov, Rostislav & Lukiyanova, Anna, 2007. "Skills Shortages and Training in Russian Enterprises," IZA Discussion Papers 2751, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Sirine Mnif, 2016. "Skill-Biased Technological Change: The Case Of The Mena Region," Economic Annals, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Belgrade, vol. 61(210), pages 101-116, July - Se.
    19. Gurgand, Marc, 2003. "Farmer education and the weather: evidence from Taiwan (1976-1992)," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 51-70, June.
    20. repec:eee:labchp:v:1:y:1986:i:c:p:357-386 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Riddell, W. Craig & Song, Xueda, 2011. "The impact of education on unemployment incidence and re-employment success: Evidence from the U.S. labour market," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 453-463, August.

    More about this item

    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:nbr:nberwo:3207. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    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.