High-skilled Labor Research Articles

Is this time different? How digitalization influences job creation and destruction

With the process of digitalization now in full swing, many are wondering how the adoption of new technologies influences job creation and destruction. Much hinges upon the specific tasks that machines take on and how many new tasks are created through the adoption of new digital technologies. Some argue that most tasks that are at risk of automation are those performed by rather low- to medium-skilled employees, while most new tasks that emerge from the adoption of digital technologies complement high-skilled labor. We present evidence derived from representative survey data from Switzerland that is consistent with this view. Specifically, we find that increased investment in digitalization is associated with increased employment of high-skilled workers and reduced employment of low-skilled workers, with a slightly positive net effect. The main effects are almost entirely driven by firms that employ machine-based digital technologies, e.g. robots, 3D printing or the Internet of Things. We do not find any significant employment effects when non-machine-based digital technologies are considered, e.g. ERP, e-commerce or cooperation support systems.

Jobless Growth in India during the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-2017)

Creation of jobs outside of agriculture is one of the biggest challenges that confront the policymakers trying to achieve ‘faster, sustainable and more inclusive growth’. The Indian economy has been growing at unprecedented rates but it has been characterized by jobless growth and informalization of job opportunities in the organized sector. The paper tries to inquire into the reasons for jobless growth in India during the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17), with the objective of providing policy recommendations to the government to increase employment. This is achieved by assessing structural changes in employment in India over the past decade and conducting gender-wise employment comparisons along with comparison with other developing countries. The paper finds factors such increase in investment in technology and automation, increased reliance on high skilled labor, sectoral inefficiencies, labor market rigidities behind India’s recent jobless growth. It is recommended that the government set up institutions to provide training to unskilled workers so as to absorb them in the formal sector. Further the government must undertake campaigns to increase awareness about girl child education to reduce female unemployment. Institutions should be set up that primarily focus on review of education and skill development to align the needs of workers with those of big businesses. It is also recommended that the government move towards relaxing some of the rigid labor laws in the Indian labor market.

Is the skills mismatch important under skill-biased technological change and imperfect substitutability between immigrants and natives?

This paper contributes to the debate on the benefits and costs of immigration, by evaluating how the mismatch between educational attainment and occupations induced by immigration affects output per worker, the wage premium, and the economy's technological level in OECD host countries. To that end, we use an R&D growth model in which technological knowledge can be directed to either low- or high-skilled labour and thereby drives the dynamics of the key economic variables. There tends to be a significant economic impact of the skills mismatch due to immigration, which amplifies the effects of the mismatch in the native population. Nevertheless, countries with a higher contribution of immigration to the skills mismatch are not necessarily those with the higher contribution in terms of economic effects. Moreover, the size and sign of the latter may vary depending on the assessed economic indicator and from country to country. Cross-country differences regarding the initial level of the high-to low-skilled ratio and the size of its shift due to immigration play a crucial role.

People and Machines: A Look at the Evolving Relationship between Capital and Skill in Manufacturing, 1860–1930, Using Immigration Shocks

Abstract This paper estimates the elasticity of substitution between capital and skill in manufacturing using immigration-induced variation in skill mix across U.S. counties between 1860 and 1930. We find that capital initially complemented both high- and low-skill labor (determined by literacy) and, unlike today, was more complementary with low-skill labor. Around 1890, capital increased its relative complementarity with high-skill labor. Simulations calibrated to our estimates imply the level of capital-skill complementarity after 1890 allowed the manufacturing sector to absorb the large wave of Eastern and Southern European immigrants with only a modest decline in less-skilled relative wages. This would not have been possible under the older production technology.

Technological change and wage premiums amongst high-skilled labour

ABSTRACTThis study examines the impact of the steam engine, which produced wide and long-lasting economic growth from the 19th century to the early 20th century, on the wages of high-skilled seamen in the Swedish merchant maritime shipping industry. The analysis focuses on the years 1869–1914, which was a transition period during which traditional sailing ships were replaced by steam-powered vessels. The study shows that all high-skilled occupations received wage gains under steam technology. The evidence on wage polarization amongst the high-skill occupations remains subtle, although there is certain evidence that wage premiums vary by occupation.

Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your High-Skilled Labor: H-1B Lottery Outcomes and Entrepreneurial Success

We study how access to high-skill labor affects the outcomes of start-up firms. We obtain exogenous variation in firms’ ability to access skilled labor by using win rates in H 1B visa lotteries. Relative to other firms that also applied for H-1B visas, firms with higher lottery win rates are more likely to receive additional venture capital funding and to have a successful exit via an IPO or acquisition. H-1B visa lottery winners also subsequently receive more patents and patent citations. Overall, our results show that access to high-skill labor is a critical determinant of success for start-up firms.

Formal education and the contemporaneous dynamics of literacy, labour market participation and poverty reduction in Burkina Faso

This research examines the link between education and sustainable development in Burkina Faso. We achieve this using data on 10,411 households from the 2014 National Survey on Household Living Conditions, and a statistical methodology based on fully parametric and semi-parametric recursive trivariate probit modelling. The results show that our embraced systemic approach is economically and statistically significant as shown by the 95% confidence intervals on the three correlation coefficients in the model. Furthermore, education is found to raise literacy skills by a factor of 2.233 for primary and 3.877 for secondary education. However, an improvement in literacy skills paradoxically reduces (−0.682) the likelihood of active labour market participation. Simultaneously however, active labour market participation is found to reduce (−1.384) the incidence of households' poverty. Therefore, to boost productivity, reduce poverty and achieve sustained economic growth, in addition to new industrial policies for structural transformation of the national economy, policy makers in Burkina Faso should consider education and minimum wage reforms to incentivise high skilled labour force participation in the local labour market.

The Impact of Foreign Direct Investment, Labour Force, and External Debt on Economic Growth in Indonesia and Malaysia

The study aims to estimate the impact of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), labour, and external debt on economic growth in Indonesia and Malaysia over the period 1980-2016. The findings are expected to serve as a reference for macroeconomic policies in Indonesia and Malaysia. Employing an Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) and Error Correction Model (ECM), we find that FDI, labour force and external debt have a significant impact on the economic growth in the long- and short- run in both countries. Statistically, the estimated models are stable. Therefore, it is recommended that the authorities in Indonesia and Malaysia should concentrate on attracting more quality FDI inflows and properly manage external debts as well as high-skilled labour force, which are vital to economic growth.

Innovation Offshoring with Fully Endogenous Growth

In recent years firms have started to offshore their innovation activities to emerging economies. This paper investigates the implications of innovation offshoring for productivity growth in a two-country framework that features a tension between access to technical knowledge and low-cost high-skilled labor in the innovation location decision. Industry and innovation tend to concentrate in the asset-wealthy country when trade costs are relatively high. A positive relationship between innovation costs and industry concentration then ensures that improved international knowledge diffusion coincides with an increase in net offshoring flows in innovation from the asset-wealthy country to the asset-poor country, and potentially with faster productivity growth.

Aspects of Multi-pass GTAW of Low Alloyed Steels

Abstract Automation of Gas Tungsten-Arc Welding (GTAW) has a high potential for increasing efficiency (increase of arc-time), because manually it is time-consuming and requires high-skilled labour. Moreover it has unique controllability, quality and does not require postprocessing. In order to demonstrate the potential, in this paper V-Groove Joints of Low Alloyed Steels are welded together with autonomous, robotized GTAW. Multiple experiments are carried out and analysed in order to establish relationship between robot speed, current, heat input and wire feed. An industrial robot is used for the GTAW process, which is equipped with automatic height-voltage controller and a 3D line scanner. A simple programming interface for welding pass generation and result comparison is also presented.

Labor market effects of demographic shifts and migration in OECD countries

The labor force of each industrial country is being shaped by three forces: ageing, education and migration. Drawing on a new database for the OECD countries and a standard analytical framework, this paper focuses on the relative and aggregate effects of these three forces on wages across different skill and age groups over 2000–2010. The variation in the age and educational structure of the labor force emerges as the dominant influence on wage changes. The impact is uniform and egalitarian: in almost all countries, the changes in the age and skill structure favor the low-skilled and hurt the highly skilled across age groups. Immigration plays a relatively minor role, except in a handful of open countries, like Australia and Canada, where it accentuates the wage-equalizing impact of ageing and education. Emigration is the only inegalitarian influence, especially in Ireland and a few Eastern European countries which have seen significant outflows of high-skilled labor to Western European Union countries.

Labor migration numbers and rights: do they trade off or advance together?

ABSTRACTThis article reconsiders the argument that as labor immigration policy opens, it must also become more restrictive in terms of immigrant rights. After discussing this tradeoff logic, positing a negative relationship between external (numbers) and internal (rights) labor migration policy, it then extends the underlying political model to show that when accounting for the lobbying pressure of firms seeking high skill labor, a very different expectation emerges. This political accommodation argument predicts a positive relationship between external and internal migration policy, or that policy related to labor immigration openness and immigrant rights should advance together, although not necessarily quickly or at the same rate. It then tests these competing propositions using a new dataset that sorts labor migration policy changes among 38 advanced industrial democracies from 1995 to 2016 into these two dimensions, finding a significant positive relationship between them.

Influence of basic research investment on corporate performance

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to add to the existing research about how corporate performance is influenced by their basic research (BR) investment. On this basis, the authors examined the moderating effect of human capital structure (HCS) on the relationship between BR investment and corporate performance.Design/methodology/approachHypotheses were tested using static and dynamic models to analyze a large-scale data of Chinese A-share listed companies.FindingsThis study provides empirical evidence that contributes to the research about how private BR investment influences corporate performance in the digital age. In addition, human resource is an important dynamic ability for enterprise development. Based on the dynamic capability theory, further research finds that the human resources practice on the knowledge stock can enhance the company’s dynamic capability, thereby enhancing the company’s core competitiveness.Research limitations/implicationsThe results may be affected by the context of the data set. This study considers the influence of private research investment type on corporate performance, further studies considering the influence of specific contextual variables, such as corporate industry differences, could yield richer insights that would help validate the results of this study.Practical implicationsThis study provides useful information for managers. As well as increasing the investment in the BR of enterprise and creating the necessary conditions to increase the competitiveness of enterprise, they should strive to adjust the structure and quality of researchers involved in BR projects.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the enterprise’s BR investment and the management of human capital resource. It points that the investment of BR positively influences the corporate performance. In addition, the increasing of high-skilled labor’s proportion positively promotes the promotion of BR investment on corporate performance.

The impact of quality rating and improvement systems on families’ child care choices and the supply of child care labor

Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS) are increasingly deployed by U.S. states to monitor and improve the quality of non-parental child care settings. By making information on program quality accessible to the public, QRIS attempts to alter parental preferences for quality-related attributes and encourage competition between providers. This paper draws on a variety of datasets to empirically characterize the way in which families and providers respond to the enactment of QRIS. Specifically, it exploits the differential timing in states’ QRIS roll-out to examine two sets of outcomes: (i) families’ child care choices and maternal employment and (ii) the supply and compensation of child care labor. Estimates from difference-in-differences models reveal several noteworthy findings. First, although QRIS induces families to shift from parental to non-parental care, economically disadvantaged families are more likely to use informal care, while their advantaged counterparts are more likely to use formal care. Second, QRIS increases the supply of high-skilled labor, particularly within the center-based sector. Third, all but the most highly-skilled child care workers experience rising compensation levels but also greater turnover. Finally, states that administer a wage compensation program alongside their QRIS experience larger increases in child care supply and compensation as well as lower turnover rates than states operating a QRIS in isolation.

INNOVATIONS AND GLOBAL ECONOMY

Globalization of the world economy has started cen-turies ago. The old trade roads like Silk Road or long ship journeys over the Oceans to both directions West and East are just the examples of simple forms of Globalization. Now-adays we are having more difficult form of Globalization of the world economy where political, social, cultural, environ-mental and military aspects are closely interconnected and deeply influence economic ones (Keohane R., Nye J., 2000). Modern globalization is the complex and tough interdepen-dence of the regions and countries which are not immedi-ate geographic neighbours. In such environment Knowledge becomes the key driver for global world economic develop-ment. Technology, knowledge and innovations are the key to raising the resource efficiency (Sepashvili, 2014). On current stage of global economic development high skill labour, new knowledge, developed technologies and con-tinuous innovations will be utilized in most efficient and pro-ductive way. Therefore, national economic policy should give particular attention to education and researches, advanced infrastructure development (easy internet access, telecommu-nications, transports etc.). Success of the country in science and more importantly, commercialization of scientific results defines positions of national firms in the global markets and generates higher incomes. Further development and unprece-dented wide spread of digital technologies together with new technologies dictates national governments to encourage and support knowledge generation and innovation creation which are resulted in profit. The policies, approaches and measures are also varying according to countries and regions.

International trade and unemployment: towards an investigation of the Swiss case

The topic of this paper has been motivated by the rising unemployment rate of low-skilled relative to high-skilled labour in Switzerland. Between 1991 and 2014, Switzerland experienced the highest relative increase in the low-skilled unemployment rate among all OECD countries. A natural culprit for this development is “globalization” as indicated by some mass layoffs in Switzerland and as commonly voiced in public debates all over the world. Our analysis, which is based on panel data covering the years 1991 to 2008 and approximately 33,000 individuals employed in the Swiss manufacturing sector, does not, however, confirm this presumption. We do not find strong evidence for a positive relationship between import competition and (low-skilled) individuals’ likelihood of becoming unemployed.

‘Knowledge Workers’ in the Baltic Sea Region: Comparative Assessment of Innovative Performance of the Countries in the Macro-Region

AbstractThe article studies the problems of human resources stemming from increased mobility, and the emergence of new aspects of migration processes. A comparative analysis of the connection between academic development in the context of university (and the science system) and the process of labour migration taking place in Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia was carried out. The article examines the limits of the model through European territorial migration process and concludes that the huge migration of high-skilled labour (called the “knowledge workers”) has had a very negative impact on the innovative and academic potential of Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and a negative impact in Estonia. In the final section, the article examines increase in the requirements for competence in the Baltic Sea macroregion of the European Union and Estonia’s university reform of 2013-2016 as an illustrative experiment to (un)resolved problems. The first results of the reform in higher education indicated that it was ineffective-for students, the good ideas of the reform proved to be a lost experiment and the mobility of knowledge workers, as the future academic resource in homeland, turned from Estonia to larger Europe, especially to Finland and the UK.

Historicizing Mobility Trajectories of Highskilled Migrants from Coastal Andhra to the United States

Guntur-Krishna districts in the state of Andhra Pradesh has seen intense mobility of professionals to the USA from among the ‘dominant’ castes of the region, particularly the Kammas. Kammas were a rural agrarian caste who have successfully transnationalized themselves, but continue to have strong connections with their region of origin. Rather than making sense of this duality only through anthropological literature on transnationalism, in this account, taking a longue durée approach, I show how certain historical moments in the region created possibilities for the Kammas to first become urbanized, and later, cater to the demand of flexible high skilled labour in the west. Using a meso and micro level schema, the article argues that transnational migration was preceded by changes in the political economy of the region due to the region’s encounter with the colonial state. Moreover, the response of the community to these changes to achieve social and economic mobility further facilitated their rural to urban migration and, later, transnational migration. Finally, this article argues that rather than understanding transnational migration patterns through a statist lens, a more dissgaregated historical analysis is vital to bring out region and community inflected constitutive elements of such migration. JEL: O15, J61, N35

Exploring the differential impact of individual and organizational factors on organizational commitment of physicians and nurses

BackgroundPhysician and nursing shortages in acute and critical care settings require research on factors which might drive their commitment, an important predictor of absenteeism and turnover. However, the degree to which the commitment of a physician or a nurse is driven by individual or organizational characteristics in hospitals remains unclear. In addition, there is a need for a greater understanding of how antecedent-commitment relationships differ between both occupational groups.Based on recent findings in the literature and the results of a pilot study, we investigate the degree to which selected individual and organizational characteristics might enhance an employee’s affective commitment working in the field of neonatal intensive care. Moreover, our aim is to examine the different antecedent-commitment relationships across the occupational groups of nurses and physicians.MethodsInformation about individual factors affecting organizational commitment was derived from self-administered staff questionnaires, while additional information about organizational structures was taken from hospital quality reports and a self-administered survey completed by hospital department heads. Overall, 1486 nurses and 540 physicians from 66 Neonatal Intensive Care Units participated in the study. We used multilevel modeling to account for different levels of analysis.ResultsAlthough organizational characteristics can explain differences in an employee’s commitment, the differences can be largely explained by his or her individual characteristics and work experiences. Regarding occupational differences, individual support by leaders and colleagues was shown to influence organizational commitment more strongly in the physicians’ group. In contrast, the degree of autonomy in the units and perceived quality of care had a larger impact on the nurses’ organizational commitment.ConclusionsWith the growing number of hospitals facing an acute shortage of highly-skilled labor, effective strategies on the individual and organizational levels have to be considered to enhance an employee’s commitment to his or her organization. Regarding occupational differences in antecedent-commitment relationships, more specific management actions should be undertaken to correspond to different needs and aspirations of nurses and physicians.Trial registrationGerman Clinical Trials Register (DRKS00004589, date of trial registration: 15.05.2013).

Servicization with skill premium in the digital economy

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine an endogenous growth model, as a component of a broader study of servicization with skill premium and its policy implications in the evolving digital economy.Design/methodology/approachThis paper develops a two-sector endogenous growth model which allows for the observed characteristics of digitally empowered structural changes. Specifically, the driving force of economic growth is the expanding variety of intermediate services as a consequence of innovation in services. The introduction of new intermediate services specifically contributes to total factor productivity in the production of service sector, and thus an uneven growth path with skill premium toward a service economy generally exists.FindingsThe principal finding of this paper is that the digitally empowered expanding variety of intermediate services due to innovation contributes significantly to total factor productivity in the production of service sector, and thus a servicization with skill premium generally exists along a steady-state path. In addition, this paper derives an optimal innovation policy to rule out the market failures due to innovation externality and market power in monopolistic competition conditions, and shows the Rybczynski effects of exogenous endowment changes in the evolving digital economy.Originality/valueThe principal contribution of this paper is to determine how unbalanced endogenous growth along a steady-state path is linked with a service economy with skill premium in the evolving digital economy. In addition to this analysis, this paper provides policy implications – namely, that a positive but finite innovation subsidy can achieve the social optimum in the digital economy, and that an exogenous increase in high-skilled labor can speed up a digitally empowered economic growth.