By reducing the commitment made by employers, fixed-term contracts can help low-skilled youth find a first job. However, the long-term impact of fixed-term contracts on these workers' careers may be negative. Using Spanish social security data, we analyze the impact of a large liberalization in...

Many young employees work on a temporary basis, which entails significantly greater income risk than "permanent" work, even for jobs in the same occupation and at a similar wage. We find that this income uncertainty leads lenders to ration credit to temporary workers, precisely at the stage of...

This paper studies the differential persistent effects of initial economic conditions for labor market entrants in the United States from 1976 to 2015 by education, gender, and race using labor force survey data. We find persistent earnings and wage reductions especially for less advantaged...

This paper empirically assesses the wage effects of the Job Corps program, one of the largest federally-funded job training programs in the United States. Even with the aid of a randomized experiment, the impact of a training program on wages is difficult to study because of sample selection, a...

This paper examines the impact of state merit-aid programs on the labor market attachment of high school-aged youths. The labor force participation rate of teenagers has fallen substantially in recent decades, coinciding with the introduction of merit-aid programs. These programs reduce the...

Rather than decrease firing costs across the board, a number of European countries have allowed firms to hire workers on fixed-duration contracts. At the end of a given duration, these contracts can be terminated at little or no cost. If workers are kept on however, the contracts become subject...

India's Industrial Disputes Act (IDA) of 1947 requires firm with more than 100 workers to pay large costs if they shrink their employment. Since the early 2000s, large Indian manufacturing firms have increasingly relied on contract workers who are not subject to the IDA. By 2015, contract...

This paper examines the persistence and long-term impacts of early labor force experiences. The paper reports a rise in employment rates for a cohort of young men as they age, but points out that those persons with poor employment records early have comparatively poor records later. In order to...