We develop a simple model featuring search frictions and a nondegenerate labor supply decision along the extensive margin. The model is a standard version of the neoclassical growth model with indivisible labor with idiosyncratic shocks and frictions characterized by employment loss and...

Unemployment rates in countries across the world are typically positively correlated with GDP. China is an unusual outlier from the pattern, with abnormally low, and suspiciously stable, unemployment rates according to its official statistics. This paper calculates, for the first time, China's...

In this paper, the added worker effect is interpreted as a response to uncertain returns to labour supply offers by members of a household. A model of household labour supply is developed In which each member's current labour force status affects the job search and participation decisions of the...

Twenty-two million families currently receive a total of $34 billion dollars in benefits from the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). In fact, the EITC is the largest cash transfer program for lower-income families at the federal level. An unusual feature of the credit is its explicit goal to use...

European countries exhibit significant differences in employment rates of adult males. Differences in labor-leisure preferences, partly determined by cultural values that vary across countries, can be responsible for part of these differences. However, differences in labor market institutions,...

Commonly used frictional models of the labor market imply that changes in frictions have large effects on steady state employment and unemployment. We use a model that features both frictions and an operative labor supply margin to examine the robustness of this feature to the inclusion of a...

Over the past 30 years, research on married women's labor force participation has concluded virtually without exception that the principal source of labor force participation rate growth for married women has been the concurrent growth of women's real wages. The experience of the 1970's...

This paper studies the background to the increase in labor force participation of older workers in Sweden since 2000. In the first part, we study how the characteristics of the elderly have changed with respect to health, education level and work environment, as well as the impact of joint...

It is well documented that individuals in couples tend to retire around the same time. But because women tend to marry older men, this means many married women retire at younger ages than their husbands. This fact is somewhat at odds with lifecycle theory that suggests women might otherwise...

The Bartik instrument is formed by interacting local industry shares and national industry growth rates. We show that the typical use of a Bartik instrument assumes a pooled exposure research design, where the shares measure differential exposure to common shocks, and identification is based on...