This paper reports the results of an individual real effort laboratory experiment where subjects are paid for measured performance. Measured performance equals actual performance plus noise. We compare a stable environment where the noise is small with a volatile environment where the noise is...

It has been claimed that many workers in modern economies think that their job is socially useless, i.e. that it makes no or a negative contribution to society. However, the evidence so far is mainly anecdotal. We use a representative dataset comprising 100,000 workers from 47 countries at four...

This paper finds that returns to computer use do not vary with the intensity of computer use. This is evidence against the productivity interpretation of these returns and supports the view that returns to computer use can be attributed tounobserved heterogeneity.