Differences In Average Earnings Research Articles

Impact of incident rheumatoid arthritis on earnings: a nationwide sibling comparison study.

RA is known to impact work ability but much of this knowledge comes from historical comparisons vs the general population that neither reflects current RA management, nor distinguishes between effects of RA and pre-existing socio-economic conditions of patients. We therefore aimed to examine earnings of patients before and after RA diagnosis, using recent data and sibling comparisons. Swedish register data were used including demographic information and healthcare utilization. Participants were patients with RA (aged 30-60 years, diagnosed with RA 2006-2017) identified in the Swedish National Patient Register, and their same-sex siblings (n = 2433:2433; mean 48 y; 72% women). Earnings data for 2001-2019 were retrieved from Statistics Sweden and analysed from 5 years before to 5 years after RA diagnosis. No differences in average earnings were observed between siblings during the 5 years before diagnosis, but during the 5 years after diagnosis, patients with RA earned on average 5.4% less annually (-1430€[95%CI -2130, -720]) than same-sexed siblings. The change in earnings for the subgroup diagnosed 2006-2010 was -8.2% (-2020€[95%CI -2930, -1120]) but for patients diagnosed 2011-2017 there was no statistically significant change in earnings compared with siblings (-1.5%; -420€[95%CI -1490, 640]). Subgroup analyses demonstrated a more negative impact on earnings for older individuals and those with lower education level. RA diagnosis was associated with lower earnings in comparison with same-sex siblings, particularly for older individuals and those with lower education level. The negative impact of RA on earnings declined or disappeared over the study period.

Inequality and income dynamics in Germany

We provide a comprehensive analysis of income inequality and income dynamics for Germany over the last two decades. Combining personal income tax and social security data allows us—for the first time—to offer a complete picture of the distribution of annual earnings in Germany. We find that cross‐sectional inequality rose until 2009 for men and women. After the Great Recession, inequality continued to rise at a slower rate for men and fell slightly for women due to compression at the lower tail. We further document substantial gender differences in average earnings and inequality over the life cycle. While for men earnings rise and inequality falls as they grow older, many women reduce working hours when starting a family such that average earnings fall and inequality increases. Men's earnings changes are on average smaller than women's but are substantially more affected by the business cycle. During the Great Recession, men's earnings losses become magnified and gains are attenuated. Apart from recession years, earnings changes are significantly right‐skewed reflecting the good overall state of the German labor market and increasing labor supply. In the second part of the paper, we study the distribution of total income including incomes of self‐employed, business owners, and landlords. We find that total inequality increased significantly more than earnings inequality. Regarding income dynamics, entrepreneurs' income changes are more dispersed, less skewed, less leptokurtic, and less dependent on average past income than workers' income changes. Finally, we find that top income earners have become less likely to fall out of the top 1 and 0.1%.

RELATIONS BETWEEN HARD COMPETENCES LEVEL AND EARNINGS IN LIGHT OF SURVEY ON HUMAN CAPITAL IN POLAND

The purpose of this article is to quantify the degree of relationship between the level of hard competencies and earnings. The analyzes are based on data from the survey on Human Capital in Poland. Four areas of competences are considered: information analysis, computer skills, mathematical skills, and dealing with the technical equipment. The differences in average earnings are presented according to the level of declared skills. A joint measure of competences is also proposed, and its values are compared with earnings. The analyses show that there are meaningful relations between the level of competences and the received remuneration.

The Effect Of Place Of Origin On The Relative Earnings Of Immigrant Women

This paper explores the earnings differentials between female immigrants from 14 places of origin when compared to each other and a number of other groups. The very large differences in average earnings between female immigrant groups are found to be largely due to human capital and family characteristic differences. The study employs OLS regression to make earnings comparisons between immigrant women from each of the 14 places of origin to three reference groups. We find that although female immigrants from most countries are doing well relative to female natives, they fall significantly behind native males and male immigrants, even after controlling for differences in human capital. Thus, some groups of immigrant women suffer a double disadvantage in the U.S. workforce, one due to gender and the other due to their relatively low levels of human capital.

The Effect of Migration on Wages: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

The objective of this paper is to employ the Hurricane Katrina evacuation into Houston, TX as a natural experiment to estimate the effect of large scale in-migration on regional earnings. Given the characteristics of the evacuees, their influx would have caused the supply of applicants for lower skilled jobs to increase proportionately more than for higher skilled jobs. We utilize a differences-in-differences-in-differences methodology in which we compare differences in average earnings in the low-skill, non-traded goods industries to the corresponding differences in the set of high skill industries in the Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth MSAs before and after the Katrina-induced migration. Unlike previous studies, we include a measure of the post-storm increase in demand for local goods and services on the demand for labor. We find evidence that the relative average payroll in the low-skill non-tradable goods industries in Houston decreased by .7% when compared to the relative change for the same group of industries in Dallas. Our findings also suggest that failure to account for demand-side influences following the migration results in significant under-estimation of wage effects due to the shift in labor supply.

Migration and Wages: A Natural Experiment from Hurricane Katrina

The objective of this paper is to employ the Hurricane Katrina evacuation into Houston, TX as a natural experiment to estimate the effect of large scale in-migration on regional earnings. Given the characteristics of the evacuees, their influx would have caused the supply of applicants for lower skilled jobs to increase proportionately more than for higher skilled jobs. We utilize a differences-in-differences-in-differences methodology in which we compare differences in average earnings in the low-skill, non-traded goods industries to the corresponding differences in the set of high skill industries in the Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth MSAs before and after the Katrina-induced migration. Unlike previous studies, we include a measure of the post-storm increase in demand for local goods and services on the demand for labor. We find evidence that the relative average payroll in the low-skill non-tradable goods industries in Houston decreased by .7% when compared to the relative change for the same group of industries in Dallas. Our findings also suggest that failure to account for demand-side influences following the migration results in significant under-estimation of wage effects due to the shift in labor supply.

Women, Race, and Ethnicity: Exploring Earnings Differentials in Metropolitan America

We draw on leading theories about the structural causes of inequality in the United States to explore inter–metropolitan differences in average earnings for white, black, Hispanic, and Asian women. Our analysis utilizes 2000 census data for a sample of 150 metropolitan areas to investigate the determinants of both women's median earnings and earnings’ inequality by race and ethnicity. We find substantial differences between the earnings of minority and white women across metropolitan areas, although the differences are not in the same direction for all groups. Among other findings, our results indicate: (1) The more retail trade and educational, health, and social service employment, the lower the earnings of most women; (2) the larger the immigrant population in an area, the higher the earnings of white and Asian, but not black or Hispanic women; and (3) residing in the South increases levels of inequality between black and white women. In summary, our results indicate that conventional predictors of aggregate earnings and earnings’ inequality operate differently for white, black, Hispanic, and Asian women at the metropolitan level. Structural characteristics of metropolitan areas all have some influence on women's economic outcomes; but those influences are consistent neither for the earnings of all groups of women nor for earnings’ inequality between groups of women.

Public-Sector Wage Comparability: The Role of Earnings Dispersion

Economists use average wage differentials to examine whether public- and private-sector workers have comparable earnings. Such average differentials, originally developed for other purposes, fail to measure the true distance from comparability. In short, if average earnings in the public and private sectors are identical, earnings need not be comparable. The authors develop alternative statistical measures of comparability that demonstrate that differences in average earnings contribute only modestly to deviations from comparability and that state and local governments in the United States deviate more from comparability than does the federal government.

Regional Earnings Inequality in Great Britain: A Decomposition Analysis

This paper investigates the degree of earnings inequality in Great Britain over the period 1975-96 using individual-based data. It finds that the contribution of within-group inequality to both earnings inequality cross-sectionally and to its trend over time is substantially more important than the contribution of between-group inequality. Thus, the primary source of increasing inequality in the overall earnings distribution is increasing inequality within regions and not differences in average earnings between regions. A decomposition of the Gini coefficient is also adopted to illustrate how regional convergence in average earnings has been accompanied by increasing overall earnings inequality in the UK. A partir des données auprès des particuliers, cet article cherche à examiner l'importance de l'inégalité des revenus régionaux en Grande-Bretagne de 1975 à 1996. Il en résulte que la contribution de l'inégalité à l'intérieur du groupe à l'inégalité des revenus par échantillon et sur le temps s'avère nettement plus importante que ne l'est l'inégalité entre groupes. Ainsi, la source primordiale de la croissance de l'inégalité de la distribution globale des revenus est l'accroissement de l'inégalité intrarégionale et non pas l'écart des revenus moyens interrégionaux. On se sert aussi du coefficient Gini désagrégé afin de démontrer comment la convergence régionale des revenus moyens se fait conjointement avec une hausse globale de l'inégalité des revenus au Royaume-Uni. Dieser Aufsatz untersucht das Ausmaß der Unterschiede von Einkommen in Großbritannien im Zeitraum 1975-1996, wobei er sich auf Daten von individuellen Fällen stützt. Der Befund zeigt, daß der Beitrag der Unterschiede innerhalb einer Gruppe sowohl im Querschnitt als auch zu ihrer langfristigen Tendenz zum Einkommensunterschied weitaus bedeutender ist als der Beitrag zu Unterschieden zwischen verschiedenen Gruppen. Die Hauptquelle zunehmender Unterschiede in der allgemeinen Einkommensverteilung ist daher die zunehmende Ungleichheit der Regionen, und nicht die Unterschiede in durchschnittlichen Einkommen zwischen einzelnen Regionen. Eine Zerlegung des Gini Koeffizienten wird auch dazu benutzt, aufzuzeigen, wie regionale Konvergenz bei durchschnittlichen Einkommen mit zunehmenden allgemeinen Einkommensunterschieden im UK einhergeht.

The information effects of origin on migrants' job search behavior.

"Migrants are generally assumed to gather specific information about the destination primarily through physical contact, or through family, friends, and acquaintances. In this paper, I propose an additional source of information: similarities between origin and destination labor markets. Data from the 1983-1987 PSID [Panel Study of Income Dynamics] are used in a two-stage least squares model of postmove search duration in the U.S. Rural-to-urban migrants (except for rural Southerners) exhibit significantly lower search duration than other groups, controlling for productivity-related characteristics and postmove earnings. In addition, employment growth differences between origin and destination are found to be better predictors of search duration than are differences in average earnings."

Male-Female Wage Differences: The Importance of Compensating Differentials

This study investigates the extent to which differences in average earnings between men and women may be the result of sorting by the sexes into jobs with different average levels of disagreeable and agreeable working conditions. An analysis of data from the 1977 Quality of Employment Survey shows that, on average, men and women hold jobs with substantially different working conditions and that these differences are of a pattern suggesting the need to pay higher wages to attract employees to the jobs held by men. Estimation of wage equations shows that these differences in working conditions contribute significantly to the ability to explain average earnings for each sex.

Sex differences in earnings: An analysis of Malaysian wage data

The conventional human capital earnings function is applied to a rich set of Malaysian wage data in an attempt to determine the origins of sex differences in average earnings. Several findings are of interest, the first being that the relationships estimated from the earnings function are similar to those typically reported for non‐LDCs. Second, less than a third of the average monthly wage difference between the sexes of about 34 per cent appears to be the consequence of either females having lower (measured) productivity than males, or females receiving lower rates of return to human capital than males. The major part of the earnings difference is apparently a consequence of employment distributions: females are much more likely to be in the low‐paying occupations.

Decomposing Differences between Groups

Somewhat divergent approaches to finding the components of group differences (for example, the difference in average earnings across gender or racial groups) have grown up in the literatures of economics and sociology. Both, however, are variants of the same underlying approach. This article illustrates different approaches and draws attention to the conditions under which two, three, or four components of the income gap between groups can be usefully distinguished. The two central issues are which standard one uses to evaluate endowment differences between groups, and whether the scales used to operationalize underlying concepts have arbitrary zero-points or not. This latter difficulty has often been neglected in empirical applications using variables such as education, region, occupation, industry, and marital status. In such cases, the choice of a comparison group is inherently arbitrary, and nothing other than an arbitrary decomposition of the residual group difference can result.

Sex and Earnings in Industrial Society: A Nine-Nation Comparison

A substantial difference in average earnings between men and women employed full-time is documented for each of nine industrial nations, and several hypothesized explanations for the earnings gap are explored: a human capital hypothesis-women earn less because they have less education and experience; a dual career hypothesis-women earn less because they adjust their work behavior to meet the demands of family obligations; and an occupational segregation hypothesis-women earn less because they are concentrated in lowlevel jobs. None of these hypotheses receives much support in any country, leaving open the possibility that the earnings differences are due to deeply entrenched institutional arrangements that limit women's opportunities and achievements.

British and American Changes in Interindustry Wage Structure Under Full Employment

V IRTUALLY the full employment of available labor and resources was tacitly assumed by most of the nineteenth-century wage theorists. Actual full employment has been a rather rare condition in the western world during the last two centuries. However, the economies of both Great Britain and the United States moved decisively toward full employment in the period between the years just before World War II and the subsequent wartime and postwar years. In what ways and to what extent has this relatively new condition of prolonged full employment affected the structure of wages? There are many ways of answering such a question, depending on what aspect of wage structure is considered. For example, it is now reasonably clear that a transition to full employment works toward the narrowing of wage differentials between workers of different grades of skill.' What happens to the relative levels of wages paid by different industries, as an economy moves toward full employment? Comparatively little attention has been devoted to this question. One outstanding study of interindustry wage structure has been the recent analysis by Donald Cullen.2 This painstaking study was mostly concerned with long-period relationships between the average wages paid by different American industries. Cullen found that the rank-order of industries was very stable, even over long periods of time, as regards the average annual earnings of their respective employees. Over a mere ten-year period, there was, naturally, even less change in interindustry wage structure than occurred over longer periods. Thus for the decade I939-49, Cullen's coefficient of rank correlation for seventy American industries was .92.3 These findings suggest that even a sharp change from very considerable unemployment (I939) to virtual full employment (I949) will have little effect on the structure of wages as between industries -at least that such a change will not alter materially the rank-order of the average wages of the various industries. In Great Britain, the full employment conditions of wartime and postwar years provide a similar contrast with the slack employment of the prewar period. Did the relative wages paid by different industries also remain stable in the face of this drastic change in labor market conditions? We shall see presently that the answer depends on how one chooses the method of measurement. Our first test of interindustry wage structure was selected to provide the greatest possible comparability between the British and American wage data and the method and data used by Cullen. We were able to find British and American wage information, prewar and postwar, for 28 industries which were reasonably comparable with the American industries selected by Cullen.4 We used i938 as a repre'E.g., see Harry Ober, Occupational Wage Differentials, I907-I947, U.S. Department of Labor, Monthly Labor Review, August I948; Louis R. Salkever, Toward a Theory of Wage Structure, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, April I953; K. G. Knowles and D. J. Robertson, Differences Between the Wages of Skilled and Unskilled Workers i8881950, Bulletin of the Oxford Institute of Statistics, xm (Apr1l I95I), I09-27 and Earnings in Engineering, I926I948, ibid. (June I95I), I79-200. Our limited purpose is to investigate interindustry differences in average earnings. We are acutely aware of the variability of wages between firms within an industry, between workers of different levels of skill, and the week-to-week variability of the earnings of individual workers. Compare Robert R. L. Raimon, The Indeterminateness of Wages of Unskilled Workers, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, vi (January 1953), I80-94; and K. G. J. C. Knowles and Ann Romanis, Dockworkers' Earnings, Bulletin of the Oxford University Institute of Statistics, xiv (September and Octo-