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Which Human Capital Matters for Rich and Poor’s Wages? Evidence from Matched Worker-Firm Data from Tunisia

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Author Info
Christophe Muller (Universidad de Alicante)
Christophe Nordman (IRD-DIAL)

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Abstract

In this paper, we study the return to human capital variables for wages of workers observed in Tunisian matched worker-firm data in 1999. This tells us how returns to human capital in a Less Developed Country like Tunisia differ from the industrial countries usually studied with matched data. We develop a new method based on multivariate analysis of firm characteristics, which allows us most of the benefits obtained by introducing firm dummies in wage equations for studying the effect of education. It also provides a human capital interpretation of the effect of these dummy variables. Moreover, in the studied data, using three firm characteristics easily collectable yields results close to those obtained by using the matched structure of the data. The workers with low wages or low conditional wages experience greater returns to human capital than workers belonging to the middle of the wage distribution, while their return to schooling is significantly lower than that of high wage workers. Wage regressions including the computed factors confirm that human capital is associated with positive intra-firm externality on wages. Therefore, a given worker would be more productive and better paid in an environment strongly endowed in human capital. However, the poorest workers do not take advantage of the human capital in the firm. Conversely, the poor benefit from working in the textile sector in terms of wages unlike the middle and high wage workers. Finally, the poorest and richest workers benefit from an innovative environment while the middle workers of the wage distribution do not.

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Paper provided by EconWPA in its series Labor and Demography with number 0501009.

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Length: 42 pages
Date of creation: 24 Jan 2005
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Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpla:0501009

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Related research
Keywords: wage returns to human capital matched worker-firm data quantile regressions factor analysis Tunisia

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
O12 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

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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. Christophe Muller & Christophe Nordman, 2005. "Human Capital And Wages In Two Leading Industries Of Tunisia: Evidence From Matched Worker-Firm Data," Working Papers. Serie AD 2005-07, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie). [Downloadable!]
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