One of the most significant changes in the labour market in the twentieth century was the rise of the internal labour market. Its origins can be found in the nineteenth century, particularly in the large service companies such as banks and the railway companies. By studying the internal labour...

We study theoretically how the adjustment to liberalization of international…nancial transaction depends upon the degree of domestic …nancial development.Using a model with domestic and international borrowing constraints, we showthat, when the domestic …nancial system is underdeveloped,...

Leaving home and entering service was a key transition in early modern England. This paper presents evidence on the age of apprenticeship in London. Using a new sample of 22,156 apprentices bound between 1575 and 1810, we find that apprentices became younger (from 17.4 to 14.7 years) and more...

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act(PRWORA) of 1996 represents a dramatic change in the US welfare state.One of its key goals was to move lone mothers, even those with youngchildren, from welfare to work. Early evidence suggests that, in concertwith a strong...

Older men have experienced the largest falls in employment over thelast twenty years. Two-fifths of men aged between 55 and 65 are withoutwork, compared to one-fifth in 1979, and the difference is equivalent to600,000 fewer jobs for this age group alone. Older women have notshared in the general...

This paper uses microdata from the United States, Britain, and Japan toexamine the effects of family leave coverage on women's employment afterchildbirth. Our three sample countries provide a range of family leavepolicy regimes. The United States had no national family leave legislationprior to...