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Wage Dispersion, Returns to Skill, and Black-White Wage Differentials

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  • David Card
  • Thomas Lemieux

Abstract

During the 1980s wage differentials between younger and older workers and between more and less educated workers expanded rapidly. Wage dispersion among individuals with the same age and education also rose. A simple explanation for both sets of facts is that earnings represent a return to a one-dimensional index of skill, and that the rate of return to skill rose over the decade. We explore a simple method for estimating and testing 'single index' models of wages. Our approach integrates 3 dimensions of skill: age, education, and unobserved ability. We find that a one-dimensional skill model gives a relatively successful account of changes in the structure of wages for white men and women between 1979 and 1989. We then use the estimated models for whites to analyze recent changes in the relative wages of black men and women.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 4365.

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Date of creation: May 1993
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:4365

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  1. Cockburn, Iain & Griliches, Zvi, 1988. "Industry Effects and Appropriability Measures in the Stock Market's Valuation of R&D and Patents," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(2), pages 419-23, May.
  2. Lillard, Lee & Smith, James P & Welch, Finis, 1986. "What Do We Really Know about Wages? The Importance of Nonreporting and Census Imputation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(3), pages 489-506, June.
  3. David Card & Alan Krueger, 1990. "School Quality and Black/White Relative Earnings: A Direct Assessment," Working Papers 652, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
  4. John Bound & Richard B. Freeman, 1991. "What Went Wrong? The Erosion of Relative Earnings and Employment Among Young Black Men in the 1980s," NBER Working Papers 3778, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. Deaton, Angus, 1985. "Panel data from time series of cross-sections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1-2), pages 109-126.
  6. Francine D. Blau & Lawrence M. Kahn, 1996. "The Gender Earnings Gap: Some International Evidence," NBER Working Papers 4224, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  7. Juhn, Chinhui & Murphy, Kevin M & Pierce, Brooks, 1993. "Wage Inequality and the Rise in Returns to Skill," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(3), pages 410-42, June.
  8. Murphy, Kevin M & Welch, Finis, 1992. "The Structure of Wages," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 107(1), pages 285-326, February.
  9. David Card & Thomas Lemieux, 1994. "Changing Wage Structure and Black-White Wage Differentials: A Longitudinal Analysis," Working Papers 701, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
  10. Bound, John & Johnson, George, 1992. "Changes in the Structure of Wages in the 1980's: An Evaluation of Alternative Explanations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(3), pages 371-92, June.
  11. Smith, James P & Welch, Finis R, 1989. "Black Economic Progress after Myrdal," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 27(2), pages 519-64, June.
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