This paper investigates how changing the length of school year, leaving the basic curriculum unchanged, affects learning and subsequent earnings. I use variation introduced by the West-German short school years in 1966-67, which exposed some students to a total of about two thirds of a year less...

We examine the relationship between the employment and compensation of managers and CEOs and the presence of a unionized workforce. We develop a simple efficiency wage model, with a tradeoff between higher wages for workers and more monitoring, which requires more managers. The model also...

Becker?s theory of human capital predicts that minimum wages should reduce training investments for affected workers because they prevent these workers from taking wage cuts necessary to finance training. In contrast, in noncompetitive labor markets, minimum wages tend to increase training of...

British secondary schools moved from a system of extensive and early selection and tracking in secondary schools to one with comprehensive schools during the 1960s and 70s. Before the reform, students would take an exam at age eleven, which determined whether they would attend an academically...

We investigate whether a causal interpretation of the robust association between cognitive skills and economic growth is appropriate and whether cross-country evidence supports a case for the economic benefits of effective school policy. We develop a new common metric that allows tracking...