Evidence from the US, Britain, and France suggests that recent growth in wage inequality has been accompanied by greater segregation of high- and low-skill workers into separate firms. A model in which workers of different skill-levels are imperfect substitutes can simultaneously account for...

This paper examines the pathways by which individuals transition from healthy to disabled. Because of the high prevalence and costs associated with disability, understanding these pathways is critical to developing interventions to prevent or minimize disability. We compare two estimates of...

While special education has become a hotly debated issue of school policy, most of the discussion has centered on the aggregate costs of providing mandated programs for disabled children. Little attention has been paid to the effectiveness of such programs or possible interactions with the...

This paper examines the role of international trade for job polarization– the decline in opportunities for mid-wage workers while those for high- and low-wage workers increase. With employer-employee matched data on virtually all workers and firms in Denmark between 1999 and 2009, we show that...

Research on sex differences in humans documents gender differences in sensory, motor and spatial aptitudes. These aptitudes, as captured by Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT) codes, predict the occupational choices of men and women in the directions indicated by this research. We simulate...

This paper develops a model of dual labor markets based on employers' need to motivate workers. In order to elicit effort from their workers, employers may find it optimal to pay more than the going wage. This changes fundamentally the character of labor markets. The modelis applied to a wide...

Studies of the earnings of union workers have consistently shown that they earn considerably more than nonunion workers. This paper considers whether part of this observed union/nonunion differential is due to unions organizing high paying primary sector jobs. We extend our earlier work on the...

This paper briefly reviews the empirical evidence on labor market segmentation and presents some new results on the similarity of the pattern of segmentation across 66 different countries. The paper goes on to consider how unemployment might be understood in a labor market segmentation...

This paper shows a widening in black-white earnings and employment gaps among young men from the mid-l970s through the 1980s that differs among subgroups. Earnings gaps increased most among college graduates and in the midwest while gaps in employment-population rates grew most among high school...

Supervisory and monitoring costs are explored to understand aspects of occupational segregation by sex. Around the turn of this century 47 percent of all female manufacturing operatives were paid by the piece, but only 13 percent of the males were. There were very few males and females employed...