Rita Asplund

Measuring wage effects of plant size

Abstract There are large plant size–wage effects in the Nordic countries after taking into account individual and job characteristics as well as systematical sorting of the workers into various plant-sizes. The plant size–wage elasticities we obtain are, in contrast to other dimensions of the wage distribution, comparable to the plant-size effects in other countries such as the U.S. with completely different institutions of wage setting. We also investigate the consequence of measurement error associated with the common practice of using midpoints of plant-size classes to estimate the plant size–wage elasticity. Our results indicate that using size–class midpoints yields essentially the same results as using exact measures of plant size.

Dimensions of the Wage-Unemployment Relationship in the Nordic Countries: Wage Flexibility Without Wage Curves

This paper analyses wage formation in the Nordic countries at the regional level by the use of micro-data. Our results deviate systematically from the main conclusions drawn by Blanchflower and Oswald (1994). We find no stable negative relation between wages and unemployment across regions in the Nordic labor markets once regional fixed effects are accounted for. Wage formation at the regional level is characterized by considerable persistence, but unemployment exerts no immediate influence on wages at the regional level. There is no evidence of a wage curve, nor of a Phillips curve, at the regional level in the Nordic countries. The results are consistent with a theoretical model where central bargaining agents determine a national wage increment, and local bargaining agents determine wage drift.

AN EQUITY PERSPECTIVE ON ACCESS TO, ENROLMENT IN AND FINANCE OF TERTIARY EDUCATION

Failure to achieve equitable access to university studies has contributed to turning the focus to the funding of higher education systems. This paper aims to review critically the literature assessing the effectiveness of existing financing schemes and changes in them as a means for reducing the prevalent under‐representation of students from a socially disadvantaged background. While the theoretical literature fails to be consensual with respect to the equity effects of student funding schemes, empirical studies remain scarce and inconclusive due to the lack of harmonized data that comprehensively describe the social make‐up of higher education attendees. For reasons of space, references are kept at a minimum but can be found elsewhere. 1

Introduction: Company training and services with a focus on low skills

This special issue of the International Journal of Manpower aims to make a contribution to broadening our limited understanding of the role and impact of employer‐provided training for low‐skilled service sector workers. It brings together seven of the papers that were presented at the international conference “Adapting Education and Training for the Enhancement of Low‐Skilled Jobs” held at Helsinki in May 2002. The papers are situated at the crossroads where three different strands of research and policymaking meet: the training of the low skilled, the system of vocational training and the role of training for the service sector. The contributions cover an interesting variety of European countries: Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, Sweden, Spain and the UK, with diverging levels of low‐skilled (un)employment, vocational training and service‐sector employment.

Youth unemployment and inactivity

Young people follow highly different trajectories from age 16 up to age 20, a time period which is often argued to be the most critical in terms of their future labour market outcomes. The focus of this report is on investigating the look of these early pathways, as well as on exploring their link to labour market outcomes in adulthood. Results are reported and compared for four Nordic countries: Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Wage formation and gender wage gaps: is there a role for job-task evaluation schemes?

Purpose - – Both academia and policymakers express a strong belief in higher average education levels exerting a narrowing impact on wage inequality in general and gender wage gaps in particular. The purpose of this paper is to scrutinize whether or not this effect extends to R&D- and export-intensive branches such as the technology industry. Design/methodology/approach - – In exploring the impact of individual and job-related background factors and, especially, of job-task evaluation schemes on the size and change in gender wage gaps in the technology industry, the paper applies an elaborated decomposition method based on unconditional quantile regression techniques. Findings - – While changes in standard human capital endowments can explain little, if anything, of the growth in real wages or the widening of wage dispersion among the Finnish technology industrys white-collar workers, a new job-task evaluation scheme introduced in 2002 seems to have succeeded, at least in part, to make the wage-setting process more transparent by re-allocating especially the technology industrys female white-collar workers in a way that better reflects their skills, efforts and responsibilities. Practical implications - – One crucial implication of this finding is that improving the standard human capital of women closer to that of men will not suffice to narrow the gender wage gap in the advanced parts of the economy and, hence, not also the overall gender wage gap. The reason is obvious: concomitant with rising average education levels, other skill aspects have received increasing attention in working life. Consequently, a conscious combination of formal and informal competencies as laid down in well-designed job-task evaluation schemes may, in many instances, offer a more powerful path for tackling the gender wage gap. Originality/value - – While the existing evidence on the impact of performance-related pay on gender wage gaps is still scarce but growing the authors know of no empirical studies analyzing the gender pay-gap effect of job-task evaluation systems.

Student Loans and the Likelihood of Graduation: Evidence from Finnish Cohort Data

Most countries have experienced soaring enrolment rates into tertiary education. While this is beneficial both to involved students and to knowledge‐based societies, it also makes the funding issue even more crucial than it is usually seen to be. This paper presents first results from an analysis of the effectiveness of student loans as a funding strategy using unique student‐level data from Finland. The focus is on the effect of student loans on the likelihood of graduation, as well as on the socioeconomic background dimension of such an effect. We find no evidence in support of the latter effect being significant.

Gender Wages and Careers in the Retail Trade and IT Services: The Case of Finland

The retail and information technology (IT) sectors are interesting extremes when it comes to men and women in the labour market. The retail trade is traditionally a female-dominated sector at the lower end of the pay scale. On average they have lower education levels and their career opportunities are rather limited. The IT sector, in contrast, is male-dominated, rapidly expanding, well-paid and offers good career prospects, especially for young, highly educated, well-trained people. The technological level is high and rapidly progressing.

Human Capital and Earnings in the Nordic Countries

Earnings differentials are commonly alleged to be notably smaller in the Nordic countries than in many other industrialized countries. Substantial differences in earnings dispersion across countries may have a number of consequences for the future role of the Nordic countries in an increasingly integrated world economy. A more compressed earnings distribution in the Nordic economies may affect both the pattern of immigration and the allocation of different production processes.