This paper offers a contract-based theory to explain the determination of standard hours, overtime hours and overtime premium pay. We expand on the wage contract literature that emphasises the role of firm-specific human capital and that explores problems of contract efficiency in the face of...

This paper adds to the literature on the relationship between military service and long-term real earnings. Based on a regression discontinuity design it compares the earnings of age cohorts containing British men who were required to undertake post-war National Service with later cohorts who...

We compare two policies of increasing British state pension provision: (a) increase the pensionable age of men and women, (b) maintain the existing retirement age but require older workers to work longer per-period hours. There are reasons for policy makers to give serious consideration to the...

Based largely on industry-level aggregate statistics, the prevailing view, and one that has strongly influenced macroeconomic thought, is that real wages during the cycle containing the Great Depression are either acyclical or countercyclical. Does this finding hold-up when more micro data are...

Using individual-level data on male non-managerial workers from the 1996 British New Earnings Survey, we estimate overtime hours and average premium pay equations. Among other issues, four broad questions are of central importance. (a) What are the impacts of straight-time pay and hours on...

Significant numbers of employees work more hours in the workplace than their contract stipulates. Such overtime work can either be paid or unpaid. This research considers overtime working in Germany and the UK and shows that the quantitative significance of both paid and unpaid overtime is...

In this paper, we compile a unique historical dataset that records strike activity in the British engineering industry from 1920 to 1970. These data have the advantage of containing a fairly homogenous set of companies and workers, covering a long period with varying labour market conditions,...

We add to the literature on the long-term economic effects of male military service. We concentrate on post-war British conscription into the armed services from 1949 to 1960. It was called National Service and applied to males aged 18 to 26. Based on a regression discontinuity design we...

This paper makes use of the British New Earnings Survey Panel Dataset between 1976 and 2010. It consists of individual-level payroll data and comprises a random sample of 1% of the entire male and female labor force. About two-thirds of within- and between-company moves involve job re-grading...

This paper offers a contract-based theory to explain the determination of standard hours,overtime hours and overtime premium pay. We expand on the wage contract literaturethat emphasises the role of firm-specific human capital and that explores problems ofcontract efficiency in the face of...