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Causes and labor market consequences of producer heterogeneity

Author: Fredrik Andersson, And

Summary of Dissertation series 2003:1

 

ANDERSSON, Fredrik, 2003, Causes and Labor Market Consequences of Producer
Heterogeneity; Department of Economics, Uppsala University, Economic Studies
73, 197 pp, ISBN 91-87268-80-9.
This thesis consists of four self-contained essays.
Essay I studies establishment-level employment changes in the Swedish Manufacturing
sector over the 1972-96 period. The results show that modest changes
in the aggregated employment record have been the resulting sum of rather large
gross flows of jobs and that this constant reshuffling of jobs has important implications
for the workforce and is closely related to process of economic growth.
Shifts in employment across industries or other observable characteristic of establishments
cannot explain the different employment outcomes across establishments.
Essay II (with A. Vejsiu) studies the determinants of plant closures in Swedish
Manufacturing. From our theoretical framework we derive and empirically test
hypotheses regarding the linkages between the probability of plant failure and
industry-specific characteristics; local labor market conditions; and plant-specific
sources of heterogeneity, including insider mechanisms in wage determination, plant
specific human capital, selection mechanisms and technology vintage effects. Our
results suggest that all these factors matter in ways that by and large conform to
the a priori hypotheses.
Essay III investigates the importance of access to product markets in explaining
the spatial wage distribution by estimating the parameters of a spatial labor
demand model. The model takes into account the effects of sorting of heterogeneous
labor and heterogeneity in transportation costs. The results are consistent
with the idea that increasing returns to scale together with transportation costs is
an important driving force behind urban agglomeration and sizeable spatial wage
differentials.
Essay IV (with H. Holzer and J. Lane) presents a dynamic analysis of workers
who persistently have low earnings over a period of three or more years. Some of
these workers manage to escape from this low-earning status over subsequent years,
while many do not. We analyze the characteristics of persons and especially of their
firms and jobs that enable some to improve their earnings status over time.

ANDERSSON, Fredrik, 2003, Causes and Labor Market Consequences of Producer Heterogeneity; Department of Economics, Uppsala University, Economic Studies 73, 197 pp, ISBN 91-87268-80-9.

This thesis consists of four self-contained essays.

Essay I studies establishment-level employment changes in the Swedish Manufacturing sector over the 1972-96 period. The results show that modest changes in the aggregated employment record have been the resulting sum of rather large gross flows of jobs and that this constant reshuffling of jobs has important implications for the workforce and is closely related to process of economic growth. Shifts in employment across industries or other observable characteristic of establishments cannot explain the different employment outcomes across establishments.

Essay II (with A. Vejsiu) studies the determinants of plant closures in Swedish Manufacturing. From our theoretical framework we derive and empirically test hypotheses regarding the linkages between the probability of plant failure andi ndustry-specific characteristics; local labor market conditions; and plant-specific sources of heterogeneity, including insider mechanisms in wage determination, plant specific human capital, selection mechanisms and technology vintage effects. Our results suggest that all these factors matter in ways that by and large conform to the a priori hypotheses.

Essay III investigates the importance of access to product markets in explaining the spatial wage distribution by estimating the parameters of a spatial labor demand model. The model takes into account the effects of sorting of heterogeneous labor and heterogeneity in transportation costs. The results are consistent with the idea that increasing returns to scale together with transportation costs is an important driving force behind urban agglomeration and sizeable spatial wage differentials.

Essay IV (with H. Holzer and J. Lane) presents a dynamic analysis of workers who persistently have low earnings over a period of three or more years. Some of these workers manage to escape from this low-earning status over subsequent years, while many do not. We analyze the characteristics of persons and especially of their firms and jobs that enable some to improve their earnings status over time.