We utilize a unique database from a large legal services provider to examine how service quality responds to the firm's available capacity and workload, and to the nature of the firm-client relationship. We develop empirical measures of both the (internal) level of resources available to the...

The present paper provides an overview of literature on the shift to services. It follows the three dimensions of structural change - final demand, the inter-industry division of labor and inter-industry productivity differences. It first looks at the ‘classics’, however (Fisher (1935),...

Several noted surveys on intra-industry dynamics have recently reached the conclusion from a large body of evidence that Gibrat's Law does not hold. However, almost all of these studies have been based on manufacturing. There are compelling reasons to doubt whether these findings hold for the...

Over the last 35 years, the U.S. economy has created service sector jobs at a faster pace than manufacturing sector jobs. Not only has this trend led to a significant shift in the composition of the labor force from manufacturing to services, but it has also fundamentally changed the...

The United States continues to run an international trade surplus in services, but business stories frequently appear about service-sector jobs moving offshore. Many Americans are particularly concerned about the loss of skilled, well-paid jobs in such fields as computer programming and...

The proliferation of service jobs in the nation has received much attention. While the manufacturing sector has suffered substantial job losses during the current business cycle, job growth in services has been brisk. Because the service sector comprises a diverse collection of service...

Continuing gains in labor productivity are essential to keep real wages and the U.S. standard of living from stagnating. After a period of strong gains in the 1960s, the average growth rate of productivity slowed substantially in the early 1970s. In the following years, productivity continued to...

The service sector has performed very differently in the recession that began in March 2001 than it did in the July 1990-March 1991 recession. Many service industries have performed poorly in the most recent downturn, demonstrating that the service sector may be less immune to negative economic...

The trend toward increasing U.S. wage inequality during the 1980s is well documented. I investigate the role of employment shifts from goods-producing to service-producing industries in contributing to increased inequality during the period 1979-1995. Earlier analyses revealed that average...