Snakes or Ladders? Skill Upgrading and Occupational Mobility in the US and the UK during the 1990s
It is frequently argued that the process of skill upgrading has both worsened the employment prospects and decreased the relative wages of unskilled workers. However, workers are not immutably either low skill or high skill, and skill upgrading may offer the opportunity for workers to move up the ‘skill ladder’. In this paper we examine the balance of these two effects. We use comparable individual-level panel data from the US and the UK to relate the probability of individual occupational movement to the extent of skill upgrading at the industry level. We find that whilst skill upgrading does indeed have a positive impact on the probability of moving up the job ladder, this is insufficient to outweigh the increased probability of unemployment. We also find that workers moving down or off the ladder suffer large wage penalties.
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| Handle: | RePEc:not:notgep:07/38 |
| Contact details of provider: | Postal: School of Economics University of Nottingham University Park Nottingham NG7 2RD Phone: (44) 0115 951 5620 Fax: (0115) 951 4159 Web page: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/gep/index.aspx More information through EDIRC
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References listed on IDEAS
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- Treble, John & van Gameren, Edwin & Bridges, Sarah & Barmby, Tim, 2001. "The internal economics of the firm: further evidence from personnel data," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(5), pages 531-552, December.
- Sicherman, Nachum & Galor, Oded, 1990.
"A Theory of Career Mobility,"
Journal of Political Economy,
University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(1), pages 169-192, February.
- Oded Galor & Nachum Sicherman, 1988. "A Theory of Career Mobility," University of Chicago - George G. Stigler Center for Study of Economy and State 51, Chicago - Center for Study of Economy and State.
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