Three states (Georgia, Oklahoma and Florida) recently introduced Universal Pre-Kindergarten (Universal Pre-K) programs offering free preschool to all age-eligible children, and policy makers in many other states are promoting similar policies. How do such policies affect the participation of...

This paper considers the impact of adverse health shocks that hit an individual’s partner on subjective well-being. Using data on couples from the German Socio-Economic Panel for the years 1984 to 2006, I compare the losses in well-being caused by own and spousal disability using...

This study examines the effects of general health and chronic diseases on the labour force participation of older working-age Australians. To account for potential endogeneity of health status, a simultaneous equation model is estimated and chronic diseases are used as instrumental variables....

Markets sometimes unravel, with offers becoming inefficiently early. Often this is attributed to competition arising from an imbalance of demand and supply, typically excess demand for workers. However this presents a puzzle, since unraveling can only occur when firms are willing to make early...

A two-period career model with symmetric information but uncertainty about each worker's ability is analyzed. Contracts are unobservable but wages are observable. It is shown that work hours are distorted upwards by contracts being unobservable and that intensifying career concerns generally...

A general equilibrium macro model is constructed to explore effects of export-led growth policies on the terms of trade and the domestic distribution of a developing region with abundant labour. This region, the South, trades with another, the North; they have different technologies and supplies...

In this working paper, Lawrence Buron, Robert Haveman, and Owen O'Donnell examine the possible reasons for the underutilization of labor among various segments of the male work force by studying foregone hours, or the gap (in terms of hours) between the amount of time actually worked and...

We propose a new explanation for differences and changes in labor supply by gender and marital status, and in particular for the increase in married women's labor supply over time. We argue that this increase as well as the relative constancy of other groups' hours are optimal reactions to...

We argue that using wage data alone, it is virtually impossible to identify whether Assortative Matching between worker and firm types is positive or negative. In standard competitive matching models the wages are determined by the marginal contribution of a worker, and the marginal contribution...