Matching Items (2)
Description
This dissertation consists of three essays on modern economic growth and structural transformation, in particular touching on the reallocation of labor across industries, occupations, and employment statuses.
The first chapter investigates the quantitative importance of non-employment in the labor market outcomes for the United States. During the last 50 years, production has shifted from goods to services. In terms of occupations, the routine employment share decreased, giving way to increases in manual and abstract ones. These two patterns are related, and lower non-employment had an important role. A labor allocation model where goods, market services, and home services use different tasks as inputs is used for quantitative exercises. These show that non-employment could significantly slow down polarization and structural transformation, and induce significant displacement within the labor force.
The second chapter, coauthored with Bart Hobijn and Todd Schoellman, looks at the demographic structure of structural transformation. More than half of labor reallocation during structural transformation is due to new cohorts disproportionately entering growing industries. This suggests substantial costs to labor reallocation. A model of overlapping generations with life-cycle career choice under switching costs and structural transformation is studied. Switching costs accelerate structural transformation, since forward-looking workers enter growing industries in anticipation of future wage growth. Most of the impact of switching costs shows on relative wages.
The third chapter establishes that job polarization is a global phenomenon. The analysis of polarization is extended from a group of developed countries to a sample of 119 economies. At all levels of development, employment shares in routine occupations have decreased since the 1980s. This suggests that routine occupations are becoming increasingly obsolete throughout the world, rather than being outsourced to developing countries. A development accounting framework with technical change at the \textit{task} level is proposed. This allows to quantify and extrapolate task-specific productivity levels. Recent technological change is biased against routine occupations and in favor of manual occupations. This implies that in the following decades, world polarization will continue: employment in routine occupations will decrease, and the reallocation will happen mostly from routine to manual occupations, rather than to abstract ones.
The first chapter investigates the quantitative importance of non-employment in the labor market outcomes for the United States. During the last 50 years, production has shifted from goods to services. In terms of occupations, the routine employment share decreased, giving way to increases in manual and abstract ones. These two patterns are related, and lower non-employment had an important role. A labor allocation model where goods, market services, and home services use different tasks as inputs is used for quantitative exercises. These show that non-employment could significantly slow down polarization and structural transformation, and induce significant displacement within the labor force.
The second chapter, coauthored with Bart Hobijn and Todd Schoellman, looks at the demographic structure of structural transformation. More than half of labor reallocation during structural transformation is due to new cohorts disproportionately entering growing industries. This suggests substantial costs to labor reallocation. A model of overlapping generations with life-cycle career choice under switching costs and structural transformation is studied. Switching costs accelerate structural transformation, since forward-looking workers enter growing industries in anticipation of future wage growth. Most of the impact of switching costs shows on relative wages.
The third chapter establishes that job polarization is a global phenomenon. The analysis of polarization is extended from a group of developed countries to a sample of 119 economies. At all levels of development, employment shares in routine occupations have decreased since the 1980s. This suggests that routine occupations are becoming increasingly obsolete throughout the world, rather than being outsourced to developing countries. A development accounting framework with technical change at the \textit{task} level is proposed. This allows to quantify and extrapolate task-specific productivity levels. Recent technological change is biased against routine occupations and in favor of manual occupations. This implies that in the following decades, world polarization will continue: employment in routine occupations will decrease, and the reallocation will happen mostly from routine to manual occupations, rather than to abstract ones.
ContributorsVindas Quesada, Alberto José (Author) / Hobijn, Bart (Thesis advisor) / Bick, Alexander (Committee member) / Ventura, Gustavo (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
The narratives on technological change and the emergence of the "fourth industrial revolution" (4IR) play a significant role in defining what has happened and is happening in the labor market. Those narratives, mainly based in developed countries, have served as a turning point for policy development, especially regarding the design and implementation of educational and labor strategies as policy instruments to cope with the challenges of inequality and its labor-related causes. However, the specificities of past labor and educational policies play a crucial role in understanding the possible effects of large-scale transformations related to technological change. In this research, I develop a theoretical model connecting the experience of the third industrial revolution, the current assumptions for the future of work agenda, the forecast regarding the possible impacts of the fourth industrial revolutions, and the areas for policy intervention. I use the model to craft a case study, where I present evidence regarding the evolution of the Chilean labor market between 1990 and 2020, following the evolution of job polarization, occupational composition, workforce educational attainment, economic complexity, and the technological ecosystem. I compared those elements with the stylized facts and assumptions of the narratives of technological change. I argue that the differences in the process of workforce adaptation (timing and material conditions) can shed light on the assumptions of the “future of work” agendas, especially by tackling how different conditions could reach different results and craft substantively different base scenarios for policy design and implementation of human capital-based interventions as the ones suggested by international organizations and forums. In the concluding chapter, I summarize the findings and comment on how to address the design of just labor transitions.
ContributorsDidier, Nicolas (Author) / Johnston, Erik (Thesis advisor) / Scornavacca, Eusebio (Committee member) / Applegate, Joffa (Committee member) / Schugurensky, Daniel, 1958- (Committee member) / Maroulis, Spiro (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023