We show that controlling for subject of degree explains a significant part of the male/female gender wage differential amongst graduates. Using data from the labour force surveys of the United Kingdom and Germany, we find similar results in these two countries: subject of degree explains about...

The influence of the working life of women on their number of children has been widely discussed among demographers. Already in 1979, Butz and Ward demonstrated a negative correlation between the fertility and workforce participation of women in the US. Since then many researchers have gathered...

We investigate the effect of broad personality traits - the Big Five - on an individual's decision to become self-employed. In particular, we test an overall indicator of the entrepreneurial personality. Since we find that the level of selfemployment varies considerably across professions, we...

The paper deals with the regulation of professions in Italy. It is a very traditional system of regulation based on inputs control. This regulation is clearly excessive for most of the professions. In fact, market failures - both in terms of information asymmetries and externalities - do not...

The market has both a coordination function and an incentive function. The first theorem of welfare economics is all about coordination; the principal-agent model is all about incentives. What is the relative importance of the market in carrying out these two functions? While there has been a...