The evidence that earnings rise with firm size and that human capital affects earnings based on labour market data are two of the most robust empirical findings in economics. In contrast the evidence for scale economies in firm data is very weak. The limited direct evidence of human capital on...

The existing literature on training is concerned with understanding the reasons why firms pay for the general skills of their workers, but without explaining which firms train which workers. This paper develops a theory that both explains the willingness of firms to pay for general training, and...

This paper argues that the prevalence of compensation systems which reward winners without explicitly identifying losers can be rationalized by workers` concern for relative payoffs. If the workers` participation constraints are binding, the firm must compensate its employees for the disutility...

Previous research has shown little difference in the average leisure time of men and women.  This finding is a challenge to the second shift argument, which suggests that increases in female labor market hours have not been compensated by equal decreases in household labor.  This paper...

The UK`s Equal Opportunities Commission has recently drawn attention to the `hidden brain drain` when women working part-time are employed in occupations below those for which they are qualified. These inferences were based on self-reporting. We give an objective and quantitative analysis of the...

Almost half the women in work in the UK work part-time, but views conflict: does this support a woman`s career or is it a dead-end trap? Cohort data on labour market involvement to age 42 show highly varied pathways through full/part-time/non-employment. Econometric estimation confirms that...

Part-time work has been a major area of employment growth for women in the UK over recent decades. Almost half the women in employment now work part-time and two-thirds have worked part-time for some part of their working lives. Part-time employment is welcomed by many women as a means of...

Two particular features of the position of women in the British labour market are the extensive role of part-time work and the large part-time pay penalty. Part-time work features most prominently when women are in their 30s, the peak childcare years and, particularly for more educated women, a...

Women working full-time in the UK earn on average about 18% per hour less than men (EOC, 2005). Traditional labour economics has focussed on gender differences in human capital to explain the gender wage gap. Although differences in male and female human capital are recognized to derive from...

In this paper we pose the question: to what extent is education responsible for the differential labour market outcomes of women and men in urban India. In particular, we investigate the extent to which education contributes to women's observed lower labour force participation and earnings than...