IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mtl/montec/9508.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Industry-Specific Capiatl and the Wage Profile: Evidence from the NLSY and the PSID

Author

Listed:
  • Parent, D.

Abstract

Using data from the NLSY (1979-1991) and from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID, 1981-1987), we seek to determine whether there is any net positive return to tenure with the current employer once we control for industry-specific capital. Using data from the PSID, Topel (JPE 1991) concluded that 10 years of seniority with an employer translated into a net return of about 25%. However, once we include total experience in the industry as an additional explanatory variable, the return to seniority vanishes almost completely when we use either OLS, GLS or IV-GLS estimation methods, although this conclusion varies somewhat according to the occupation, some occupation classes showing a negative net return to tenure and others showing a positive net return. Note also that this result holds whether the analysis is carried out at the 1-digit, 2-digit or 3-digit level. Therefore, it seems that what matters most for the wage profile in terms of human capital is not so much firm-specificity but industry-specificity. Avec les données du NLSY ainsi que celles du Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), on cherche à déterminer s'il y a un rendement positif net lié à l'ancienneté dans la firme. Topel (JPE 1991) a montré avec un échantillon du PSID l'existence d'un rendement substantiel (25 % en 10 ans). Toutefois, du moment que l'on inclut l'expérience dans l'industrie courante dans l'équation de salaire (en plus de l'ancienneté dans la firme ainsi que l'expérience totale de travail), l'effet d'ancienneté disparaît presque complètement, que l'on estime par simples moindres carrés généralisés ou par la méthode des variables instrumentales (IV-GLS), et ce, avec les deux échantillons différents. ¸ noter également que ce résultat est robuste au degré d'agrégation des classes d'industries.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Parent, D., 1995. "Industry-Specific Capiatl and the Wage Profile: Evidence from the NLSY and the PSID," Cahiers de recherche 9508, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en économie quantitative, CIREQ.
    • Handle: RePEc:mtl:montec:9508
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. MacLeod, W. Bentley & Malcomson, James M., 1993. "Specific investment and wage profiles in labour markets," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(2-3), pages 343-354, April.
    2. John M. Abowd & Francis Kramarz & David N. Margolis, 1999. "High Wage Workers and High Wage Firms," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(2), pages 251-334, March.
    3. Joseph G. Altonji & Robert A. Shakotko, 1987. "Do Wages Rise with Job Seniority?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 54(3), pages 437-459.
    4. MacLeod, W Bentley & Malcomson, James M, 1993. "Investments, Holdup, and the Form of Market Contracts," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(4), pages 811-837, September.
    5. Finnie, R., 1993. "Tenure Experience, and Men's and Women's Wages: Panel Estimates from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth," Papers 9305, Laval - Recherche en Politique Economique.
    6. Topel, Robert H, 1991. "Specific Capital, Mobility, and Wages: Wages Rise with Job Seniority," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(1), pages 145-176, February.
    7. Abraham, Katharine G & Farber, Henry S, 1987. "Job Duration, Seniority, and Earnings," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(3), pages 278-297, June.
    8. Jovanovic, Boyan, 1979. "Firm-specific Capital and Turnover," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(6), pages 1246-1260, December.
    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. Parent, Daniel, 1999. "Wages and Mobility: The Impact of Employer-Provided Training," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(2), pages 298-317, April.
    2. Parent, Daniel, 2002. "Matching, human capital, and the covariance structure of earnings," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 375-404, July.
    3. Parent, Daniel, 1996. "Survol des contributions théoriques et empiriques liées au capital humain," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 72(3), pages 315-356, septembre.
    4. Burdett, Ken & Coles, Melvyn, 2010. "Wage/tenure contracts with heterogeneous firms," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(4), pages 1408-1435, July.
    5. Shintaro Yamaguchi, 2010. "Job Search, Bargaining, and Wage Dynamics," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 28(3), pages 595-631, July.
    6. Buchinsky, Mosche & Kramarz, Francis & Fougère, Denis & Kamionka, Thierry & Beffy, Magali, 2006. "The Returns to Seniority in France (and Why are They Lower than in the United States?)," CEPR Discussion Papers 5486, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Munasinghe, Lalith & Sigman, Karl, 2004. "A hobo syndrome? Mobility, wages, and job turnover," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 191-218, April.
    8. Roland A. Amann & Tobias J. Klein, 2012. "Returns to type or tenure?," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 175(1), pages 153-166, January.
    9. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2291-2372 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. I. Sebastian Buhai & Coen N. Teulings, 2014. "Tenure Profiles and Efficient Separation in a Stochastic Productivity Model," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(2), pages 245-258, April.
    11. Ferreira, Priscila, 2009. "Returns to job mobility: the role of observed and unobserved factors," ISER Working Paper Series 2009-12, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    12. VILHUBERT, Lars, 1999. "Sector-Specific on-the-Job Training: Evidence from U.S. Data," Cahiers de recherche 9906, Universite de Montreal, Departement de sciences economiques.
    13. Lalith Munasinghe & Brendan O'Flaherty, 2005. "Specific Training Sometimes Cuts Wages and Always Cuts Turnover," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(2), pages 213-234, April.
    14. Lars Vilhuber, 1997. "Sector-Specific On-the-Job Training: Evidence from U.S. Data," CIRANO Working Papers 97s-42, CIRANO.
    15. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2439-2483 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Jeremy Lise & Costas Meghir & Jean-Marc Robin, 2016. "Matching, Sorting and Wages," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 19, pages 63-87, January.
    17. VILHUBERT, Lars, 1999. "Wage Flexibility and Contract Structure in Germany," Cahiers de recherche 9905, Universite de Montreal, Departement de sciences economiques.
    18. Ken Burdett & Melvyn Coles, 2010. "Tenure and Experience Effects on Wages: A Theory," CESifo Working Paper Series 3203, CESifo.
    19. David N. Margolis, 1996. "Cohort Effects and Returns to Seniority in France," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 41-42, pages 443-464.
    20. Bent Jesper Christensen & Rasmus Lentz & Dale T. Mortensen & George R. Neumann & Axel Werwatz, 2005. "On-the-Job Search and the Wage Distribution," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(1), pages 31-58, January.
    21. Coen N. Teulings & Martin A. van der Ende, 2000. "A Structural Model of Tenure and Specific Investments," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 00-009/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 30 Nov 2002.
    22. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Paul Hek & Daniel Vuuren, 2011. "Are older workers overpaid? A literature review," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 18(4), pages 436-460, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    HUMAN RESOURCES; INDUSTRY;

    JEL classification:

    • J41 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Labor Contracts

    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:mtl:montec:9508. 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: Sharon BREWER (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cdmtlca.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.