We use the Michigan Panel Data Study on Income Dynamics to decompose the well-known rise in cross-sectional variance of individual male earnings in the U.S. into permanent and transitory components. We find that about half of the increase has arisen from an increase in the variance of permanent...

We derive the efficiency loss from using grouped data to estimate coefficients of variables that vary across groups but not individuals within a group (e.g., state unemployment rates) when micro data are unavailable on the dependent variable. We present an empirical example of our theoretical...

This paper asks whether wage subsidies encourages participants to move into jobs with greater wage growth. We provide an analytical framework that identifies the key causal links between earnings subsidies and both within-and between-job wage growth. This framework highlights the importance of...

Measures of inequality and mobility based on self-reported earnings reflect attributes of both the joint distribution of earnings across time and the joint distribution of measurement error and earnings. While classical measurement error would increase measures of inequality and mobility there...

This paper asks two questions about child poverty dynamics. The first is whether long-run transitions out of poverty have changed. The second is whether the events associated with exits from poverty have changed. We use the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to contrast the patterns of children 0 to...

This paper uses data from the Luxembourg Income Study to explore the role of differences in supply shifts in explaining cross-national differences in the rise in earnings inequality. Changes in returns to age and education are estimated for eight countries using a common specification of...

This paper explores the wage and job dynamics of less-skilled workers by estimating a structural model in which agents choose among jobs that differ in initial wage and wage growth. The model also formalizes the intuitive notion that some of these jobs offer "stepping stones" to better jobs. The...