From a new NBER Working Paper, "work of the Past, Work of the Future," by David Autor
Abstract:
Labor markets in U.S. cities today are vastly more educated and skill-intensive than they were five decades ago. Yet, urban non-college workers perform substantially less skilled work than decades earlier. This deskilling reflects the joint effects of automation and international trade, which have eliminated the bulk of non-college production, administrative support, and clerical jobs, yielding a disproportionate polarization of urban labor markets. The unwinding of the urban non-college occupational skill gradient has, I argue, abetted a secular fall in real non-college wages by: (1) shunting non-college workers out of specialized middle-skill occupations into low-wage occupations that require only generic skills; (2) diminishing the set of non-college workers that hold middle-skill jobs in high-wage cities; and (3) attenuating, to a startling degree, the steep urban wage premium for non-college workers that prevailed in earlier decades. Changes in the nature of work—many! of which are technological in origin—have been more disruptive and less beneficial for non-college than college workers.
Gated copy here.
You will find more infographics at Statista
A new working paper by Michael Lovenheim and Alexander Willen, The Long-run Effects of Teacher Collective Bargaining
Abstract:
Teacher collective bargaining is a highly debated feature of theeducation system in the US. This paper presents the firstanalysis of the effect of teacher collective bargaining laws onlong-run labor market and educational attainment outcomes,exploiting the timing of passage of duty-to-bargain laws acrosscohorts within states and across states over time. UsingAmerican Community Survey data linked to each respondent's stateof birth, we examine labor market outcomes and educationalattainment for 35-49 year-olds, separately by gender. We findrobust evidence that exposure to teacher collective bargaininglaws worsens the future labor market outcomes of men: in thefirst 10 years after passage of a duty-to-bargain law, maleearnings decline by $2,134 (or 3.93%) per year and hours workeddecrease by 0.42 hours per week. The earnings estimates for menindicate that teacher collective bargaining reduces earnings by$213.8 billion in the US annually. We also find evidence oflower male employment rates, which is driven by lower labor forceparticipation. Exposure to collective bargaining laws leads toreductions in the skill levels of the occupations into which maleworkers sort as well. Effects are largest among black andHispanic men. Estimates among women are often confounded bysecular trend variation, though we do find suggestive evidence ofnegative impacts among nonwhite women. Using data from the 1979National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, we demonstrate thatcollective bargaining laws lead to reductions in measurednon-cognitive skills among young men.
Gated copy here.
From James M. Poterba, Steven F. Venti, David A. Wise, "The Long Reach of Education: Health, Wealth and DI Participation:"
Between 1972 and 2012, the
fraction of the population with low levels of education has declined dramatically and the
fraction with higher levels of education has increased. This change in the composition
of educational attainment in the population places downward pressure on disability
rates. Our estimates suggest that over the past two decades, the upward pressure on
DI rates arising from increasing educational disparities in health, wealth and
employment has been roughly offset by the downward pressure arising from the
declining fraction of the population with low levels of education.
