This paper examines whether subjective expectations of unemployment are reliable indicators of the probability of becoming unemployed, and investigates their association with wage growth. We find that workers' fears of unemployment are increased by their previous unemployment experience and by...

In the 1997 and 1998 waves of the British Household Panel Survey, workers are asked to assess their level of job security in terms of the probability of becoming unemployed within the next year. We examine whether these perceptions of insecurity are purely subjective or are systematically...

In 1996 and 1997, approximately 1 in 10 British workers thought that it was either likely or very likely that they would lose their job within 12 months. Increased job insecurity has been touted as a possible cause for the decline of equilibrium unemployment in Britain and the United States...

Recent theoretical developments relating to investment under uncertainty have highlighted the importance of irreversibility for the timing of investment expenditures and their expected returns. This has subsequently stimulated a growing empirical literature which examines uncertainty and...

This paper focuses on the determinants of aggregate investment spending in the UK for the industrial and commercial company (ICC) sector. It complements recent work by Cuthbertson and Gasparro (1995), who study an augmented Tobin's q model of investment in the manufacturing sector. Important...

There are two findings that are conspicuous in almost all studies of individual wage determination. First, standard cross-section wage equations rarely account for more than half of the total variance in earnings between individuals. Second, there are large and persistent inter-industry wage...

Women typically earn less than men. The reasons are not fully understood. Previous studies argue that this may be because (i) women 'don't ask' and (ii) the reason they fail to ask is out of concern for the quality of their relationships at work. This account is difficult to assess with standard...

Being told the sex of your unborn child is a major exogenous 'shock'. In the first study of its kind, we collect before-and-after data from hospital wards. We test for the causal effects of learning child gender upon people's degree of risk-aversion. Using a standard Holt-Laury criterion, the...

The idea that humans especially females are prone to some form of 'midlife crisis' has typically been viewed with extreme skepticism by social scientists. We point out the potential equivalence between an age U-shape in a new well-being literature and a matching hill-shape in especially female...

According to the well-being measure known as the U.N. Human Development Index, Australia now ranks 3rd in the world and higher than all other English-speaking nations. This paper questions that assessment. It reviews work on the economics of happiness, considers implications for policymakers,...