In this paper we develop a model capturing key features of the Roy model, a search model, compensating differentials, and human capital accumulation on-the-job. We establish which features of the model can be non-parametrically identified and which cannot. We estimate the model and use it to...

During the last few decades, aggregate wage growth has been very unevenly distributed across space in Germany. While wages in Southern German local labor markets rose by up to 28 log points, they increased only modestly or even declined in the north. Similar results apply to employment changes....

The debate about the impact of routine-biased technical change on wages revolves around the question whether occupational or overall wage distributions polarized. This paper instead argues that routine task prices should decline compared to abstract and manual task prices. I propose a new...

We analyze self-selection and sorting of emigrants from Finland, using full-population administrative data from Statistics Finland. We analyze emigration events lasting at least five years and decompose migrant self-selection into education, occupation, and unobserved abilities. Our analysis...

This paper proposes a new approach to estimate task prices per efficiency unit of skill in the Roy model. I show how the sorting of workers into tasks and their associated wage growth can be used to identify changes in task prices under relatively weak assumptions. The estimation exploits the...

The aim of this paper is to provide fresh empirical evidence on the mechanisms through which wage inequality affects worker satisfaction.Theoretically, the wages of others may affect workers' utility for two main reasons: Workers may derive well-being from their social status (the comparison...

It is often believed that without instrument, endogenous sample selection models are identified only if a covariate with a large support is available (see Chamberlain, 1986, and Lewbel, 2007). We propose a new identification strategy mainly based on the condition that the selection variable...

This paper presents the econometric approach to causal modeling. It is motivated by policy problems. New causal parameters are defined and identified to address specific policy problems. Economists embrace a scientific approach to causality and model the preferences and choices of agents to...