We investigate the effect of social interactions on labor market outcomes using a direct measure of social contacts based on information about individuals' three best friends and their characteristics. We examine the effect of the number of employed friends on the transition from non-employment...

We provide new evidence about earnings and labour market volatility in Britain over the period 1992-2008, and for women as well as men. (Most research about volatility refers to earnings volatility for US men.) We show that earnings volatility declined slightly for both men and women over the...

We study the intergenerational effects of maternal education on children's cognitive achievement, behavioral problems, grade repetition and obesity. We address endogeneity of maternal schooling by instrumenting with variation in schooling costs when the mother grew up. Using matched data from...

We examine the determinants of low income transitions using first-order Markov models that control for initial conditions effects (those found to be poor in the base year may be a nonrandom sample) and for attrition (panel retention may also be non-random). Our econometric model is a form of...

We present identification and estimation results for the "collective" model of labour supply in which there are discrete choices, censoring of hours and nonparticipation in employment. We derive the collective restrictions on labour supply functions and contrast them with restrictions implied by...

This paper examines changes in the distribution of wages using bounds to allow for the impact of non-random selection into work. We show that bounds constructed without any economic or statistical assumptions can be informative. However, since employment rates in the UK are often low they are...

We consider the impact of tax credits and income support programs on female education choice, employment, hours and human capital accumulation over the life-cycle. We analyze both the short run incentive effects and the longer run implications of such programs. By allowing for risk aversion and...