We analyse the information in the Dictionary of Occupational Titles to characterize the structure of labour demand. Two dimensions, an intellectual factor and a dexterity factor capture most variation in job requirements. Job complexity in relation to Things correlates highly with the dexterity...

The paper provides a theoretical foundation for the empirical regularities observed in estimations of wage consequences of overeducation and undereducation. Workers with more education than required for their jobs are observed to suffer wage penalties relative to workers with the same education...

In the Netherlands auditors can be trained in a part-time educational track in which students combine working and studying or in a full-time educational track. The former training is relatively firm-specific whereas the latter training is relatively general. Applying human capital theory, we...

We analyse data from personnel records of a large firm producing energy and telecommunication and test for the effect of deviations between required and attained education of workers. Required education is measured as hiring standards set by the firm. We find the usual effects of over- and...

We use data on refugees admitted to the Netherlands that include registration of education in their homeland by immigration officers. Such data are seldom available. We investigate the quality and reliability of the registrations and then use them to assess effects on refugees’ economic...

This paper examines the size of inter-industry wage dispersion in Portugal and compares with other countries. We find that the country has a high inter-industry wage inequality compared with the European standard. Nevertheless, the dispersion reduced over the 1980s and the early 1990s along a...

We extend the Altonji and Card (1991) framework for analysing the impact of immigrants on natives’ wages from two to three labour types and estimate reduced form wage equations for The Netherlands, United Kingdom and Norway. We find very small effects on natives’ wages and no dominant robust...

While uncertainty abounds in almost any decision on investment in schooling, it is mostly ignored in research and virtually absent in labour economics text books. This paper documents the scope for risk, discusses the tough disentanglement of heterogeneity and risk, surveys the analytical...

We use two large Dutch datasets to estimate the Risk Augmented Mincer equation and test for risk compensation in expected earnings. We replicate earlier findings of a positive premium for risk and a negative premium for skew and add confirmation of the key results if we control for individual...

Firms hiring fresh graduates face uncertainty on the future productivity of workers. Intuitively, one expects starting wages to reflect this. Formal analysis supports the intuition. We use the dispersion of exam grades within a field of education as an indicator of the heterogeneity that...