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Efforts and Wages: A New Look at the Inter-Industry Wage Differentials

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Author Info
Edward E. Leamer
Christopher Thornberg

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Abstract

We provide evidence that US workers face a wage-effort offer curve with the high-wage high-effort jobs occurring in the capital intensive sectors. We find that real wage offers rose at every level of effort during the 1960's, a shift which is consistent with a decline in the rental cost of capital. During the 1970's, when relative prices of labor-intensive goods declined, the wage-effort offer curve twisted, offering lower pay for the low-paid jobs in the labor-intensive sectors but higher pay for the high-paid jobs in the capital-intensive sectors. In the 1980's, workers at every wage level began to work more hours for the same weekly wage. This we loosely attribute either to the increasing cost of non-wage benefits, especially health care, or to the introduction of new equipment. In studying the wage-effort offer curve rate of unionization, education, and rent sharing.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 6626.

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Date of creation: Jun 1998
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:6626

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
J41 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Labor Contracts

References listed on IDEAS
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  1. Moffitt, Robert, 1984. "The Estimation of a Joint Wage-Hours Labor Supply Model," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(4), pages 550-66, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. William T. Dickens & Lawrence F. Katz, 1987. "Interindustry Wage Differences and Industry Characteristics," NBER Working Papers 2014, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Abowd, John M & Card, David, 1987. "Intertemporal Labor Supply and Long-term Employment Contracts," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(1), pages 50-68, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Deardorff, Alan V & Stafford, Frank P, 1976. "Compensation of Cooperating Factors," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 44(4), pages 671-84, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Barry T. Hirsch & David A. MacPherson, 1993. "Union membership and coverage files from the Current Population Surveys: Note," Industrial and Labor Relations Review, ILR Review, ILR School, Cornell University, vol. 46(3), pages 574-578, April.
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  7. Calvo, Guillermo A, 1975. "Efficient and Optimal Utilization of Capital Services," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 65(1), pages 181-86, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Barzel, Yoram, 1973. "The Determination of Daily Hours and Wages," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 87(2), pages 220-38, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Abowd, John M & Card, David, 1989. "On the Covariance Structure of Earnings and Hours Changes," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 411-45, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Bischoff, Charles W & Kokkelenberg, Edward C, 1987. "Capacity Utilization and Depreciation-in-Use," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 19(8), pages 995-1007, August.
  11. Lindsay, C M, 1971. "Measuring Human Capital Returns," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(6), pages 1195-1215, Nov.-Dec.. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Shapiro, Carl & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1984. "Equilibrium Unemployment as a Worker Discipline Device," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 433-44, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Biddle, Jeff E & Zarkin, Gary A, 1989. "Choice among Wage-Hours Packages: An Empirical Investigation of Male Labor Supply," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 7(4), pages 415-37, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Lundberg, Shelly J, 1988. "Labor Supply of Husbands and Wives: A Simultaneous Equations Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 70(2), pages 224-35, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Walter Y. Oi, 1962. "Labor as a Quasi-Fixed Factor," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 70, pages 538. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, 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. Yih-Chyi Chuang & Pi-Fum Hsu, 2004. "FDI, trade, and spillover efficiency: evidence from China's manufacturing sector," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 36(10), pages 1103-1115, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Thomas Moutos & William Scarth, 2002. "Technical Change and Unemployment: Policy Responses and Distributional Considerations," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
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