How do firms respond to technological advances that facilitate the automation of tasks? Which tasks will they automate, and what types of worker will be replaced as a result? We present a model that distinguishes between a task's engineering complexity and its training requirements. When two...

Despite ubiquitous discussions of robots' potential impact, there is almost no systematic empirical evidence on their economic effects. In this paper we analyze for the first time the economic impact of industrial robots, using new data on a panel of industries in 17 countries from 1993-2007. We...

As thousands of undergraduates across the UK take their exams, a study by Andy Feng and Georg Graetz reveals the importance of the results for subsequent earnings - specifically the value of a First compared with an Upper Second and the difference between an Upper Second and a Lower Second.

How does measured performance at university affect labor market outcomes? We show that degree class - a coarse measure of student performance used in the UK - causally affects graduates' industry and hence expected wages. To control for unobserved ability, we employ a regression discontinuity...