Zafiris Tzannatos

Women and Labor Market Changes in the Global Economy: Growth Helps, Inequalities Hurt and Public Policy Matters

This report examines the level and changes in female and male participation rates, employment segregation, and female wages relative to male wages across the world economy. It funds sufficient evidence to support the view that labor markets in developing countries are transformed relatively quickly in the sense that gender differentials in employment and pay are narrowing much faster than they did in industrialized countries. However, the report evaluates the inefficiencies arising from persisting gender differentials in the labor market and finds them to be potentially significant. The estimates also indicate that the resulting deadweight losses are borne primarily by women while men gain mainly in relative terms-there are no real winners from discrimination. The paper concludes that growth benefits women at large, inequalities can have significantly adverse effects on welfare, and market-based development alone can be a weak instrument doe reducing inequality between the sexes. To break the vicious cycle of womens low initial human capital endowments and inferior labor market outcomes compared to mens, the report proposes greater access to education and training for girls and women, enforceable equal pay and equal employment opportunities legislation, a taxation and benefits structure that treats reproduction as an economic activity and women as equal partners within households, and a better accounting of womens work to include invisible production.

Child labor and school enrollment in Thailand in the 1990s

This report examines the situation of child labor in Thailand in the last decade. It finds that child labor has decreased significantly, for example, the labor force participation rates of those aged 13-14 years has almost halved since 1990. Despite this decline, 1.6 million children below the age of 16 are out of school of whom 1.2 million are between 12 and 14 years. Most of them are from poor families. Many face harsh conditions of employment that adversely affect their physical and mental development and can lock them into poverty in the future thus perpetuating a vicious cycle. Empirical analysis suggests that at younger ages (below 14) direct education costs deter school attendance. As the child gets older, income effects become more important determinants of child labor than the costs of education. This report examines what incentives the household can be provided with to keep children in school, the role of public education, and what can be done in the labor market through additional measures for those children who, notwithstanding the previous two interventions, will continue to be at work. Education subsidies are found to be justified from a social policy point of view: indeed there is a failure in the market for education/child labor. However, subsidies alone will not reduce child labor/increase education by much. Rather, public support to basic education should continue along with policies that enhance growth and reduce poverty.

Current issues in labour economics

Labour Economics: An Overview of Some Recent Theoretical and Empirical Developments D.Sapsford & Z.Tzannatos - Home-Production and the Allocation of Time A.Cigno - The Theory of Search in Labour Markets C.J.McKenna - Implicit Contract Theory A.Manning - Union Bargaining: A Survey of Recent Work A.Ulph & D.Ulph - Strikes: Models and Evidence D.Sapsford - Segmented Labour Markets R.McNabb & P.Ryan - The Economics of Discrimination: Theory and British Evidence Z.Tzannatos - The Labour Market in the Open Economy G.Alogoskoufis - Profit Sharing S.Estrin & S.Wadhwani - End Notes - References - Index

Training and Skills Development in the East Asian Newly Industrialised Countries: A Comparison and Lessons for Developing Countries.

Abstract In this article we examine the organization and funding of training in a sample of newly industrialized economies (Korea, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan, China). The findings lend support to the argument that there is no single training system appropriate for all countries, and much depends on the countrys developmental stage and specific characteristics including non-economic ones (such as culture and ethnic composition of the population). However, some characteristics of training seem to be more appropriate than others. First, late specialization in school curricula and acquisition of specialized skills in-service are desirable features. Second, we would advocate measures that encourage private finance of training without acting as a tax on labour. Third, training institutions should have autonomy for student selection, staff recruitment and choice of courses. Fourth, employers should participate in training to a great extent. Fifth, regular evaluations of training policies should take place, ...

Economic and demographic effects on working women in Latin America.

The paper uses historical census data and the latest household surveys to investigate the evolution of female employment in Latin America, the effect of demographic factors on female labor force participation, and the reasons for the observed male-female gap in labor earnings. The findings show that, though womens labor force participation in Latin America has indeed increased despite the adverse economic conditions of the last two decades, marriage and fertility still exercise a large negative effect on womens labor supply. On average in the 15 countries studied, marriage reduces the probability that a woman would work by half, and each child by a further 3–5% These effects result in age-participation profiles that decrease with age although the econometric analysis suggests that, as women get older, they have a ceteris paribus greater probability to seek employment. In all the countries studied women are rewarded less than men and gender differences in human capital characteristics cannot account for the observed earnings differential. The paper discusses the significance of the findings for potential policies to assist women, especially in the areas of education and fertility, and also suggests the direction of further reserarch.

Wage Determination under Collective Bargaining

The analysis of the previous chapter was concerned with the union’s objectives in respect of the wage rate and employment of its membership. In order to analyse wage determination in the presence of trade unions, it is also necessary to consider the employer’s equilibrium levels of wages and employment. Since these will, as we shall see, typically differ from those of the union, it is also necessary to consider the negotiating or collective-bargaining process which takes place between the union and the employer in order to determine the wage that will actually be paid within the limits set by the preferences of these two parties.

Wage and Employment Determination

At the simplest level of analysis, wages, viewed as the price of labour, are seen as being straightforwardly determined by the intersection of labour demand and supply curves in the market for labour. This view is clearly illustrated in the opening sentence of Hicks’s Theory of Wages, first published in 1932. According to Hicks: The theory of the determination of wages in a free market is simply a special case of the general theory of value. Wages are the price of labour; and thus, in the absence of control, they are determined, like all prices, by supply and demand. (1932, p. 1)

Discrimination in the Labour Market

This chapter has three main sections. First, it outlines the theory of discrimination. Discrimination has always proved to be a challenging topic in economics: why and how can a group of workers (such as women, ethnic or racial minorities) be systematically subjected to a different treatment than another group (such as men or white persons) in a competitive labour market driven by the pursuit of profits by employers?

Labour Supply: Extensions

This chapter deals with two developments in the study of labour supply: the so-called theory of allocation of time and the ‘second-generation’ labour supply models.

Labour Supply: The Basic Model

The supply of labour is defined as the amount of labour, measured in person-hours, offered for hire during a given time-period. Taking population as given, the quantity of labour supplied depends on two main factors. First, there are the numbers engaged in or seeking paid employment, which together make up the labour force or the supply of workers. This amount can conveniently be expressed as a fraction or percentage of the total population, to give an activity or labour force participation rate. Second, there is the number of hours that each person is willing to supply once he or she is in the labour force — the supply of hours. The determinants of these two dimensions of labour supply are discussed in this chapter, while Chapter 3 explores a number of extensions to the basic model. First, we consider the supply of workers.