Wage Earners Research Articles

The Effect of Long Working Hours on Mental Health among Korean Wage Earners

The Effect of Long Working Hours on Mental Health among Korean Wage Earners

University graduates in metropolitan and peripheral areas: mobility, occupational choice and outcomes

ABSTRACT This study explores the relationship between mobility patterns, occupational choices and performance outcomes of university graduates from metropolitan and peripheral areas. After statistical matching, we find opposite outcomes for geographically mobile wage earners and entrepreneurs. Graduates from the periphery who stay in the study region to work have an inferior performance outcome compared with those who move to the metropolitan region. This ‘penalty’ is not present for non-movers in metropolitan areas. Non-mobile entrepreneurs benefit from attachment to their home region, in particular in the periphery. These findings can help direct regional policy aimed at retaining graduates and promoting regional development.

Using Neural Networks to Predict Wages Based on Worker Skills

Abstract This paper describes the results of our Neural Network (NN) models that predict annual wages based on the combination and levels of 35 different skills possessed by wage earners. These models can estimate the value of skills for skill-based compensation systems. They can be used by employers to determine how much to compensate different combinations of skills and by employees to estimate what they should be paid. Finally, governments can use the models to support the development and analysis of labor policies. We collect and integrate official U.S. Government data on 35 general job skills with the annual wage data for over 900 standard occupations. The skills data is then used as inputs to train an artificial intelligence (Al) neural network (NN) models. The resulting NN models train to above 70 percent accuracy in predicting annual wage levels based on the combination and levels of 35 different skills. This research makes use of authoritative U.S. Government data in new ways that can be used to better understand the connections between general skills and their relationships to wages. The need for these types of analytical tools is all the more important as changes in the job market have been severely impacted by the COVID 19 pandemic and are increasingly at risk of being replaced by automation.

“COMMUNITY PROSPECTIVE EXPERIENCE DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC”

Background: The Covid -19 disease is very much present in our locality of 4,105 households and 25,545 people. We intend to describe most of the events related to Covid 19 disease like, occurrence of a case, new cases, progress of events, case management, recovery and perceptions of the community. Ours is an open community consisting of 4,105 houses. Methods: This is a prospective observation study of “Covid 19 disease phenomenon” in our community. The observations are about frequency, trends, progress and behavior.We planned to go round the community for 2 hours a day, to observe and record all that happens concerning Covid 19 disease, and also talk to those affected and record their perceptions in a validated questionnaire consisting of 20 close ended questions with answers graded on Leikert scale. The facts are put in “Observation sentence” and joined to make “Observation paragraphs”. Results: There were 167 Covid cases, 32 cases suffered severely, 91 cases mild form, 44 Covid positive only with no symptoms at all, and 20 cases died. There was fear of the disease to begin with, community learnt the disease, understood how to treat, and later normal life settled. Conclusion:The Covid 19 disease struck the community suddenly, there were new cases, severe form, mild form, asymptomatic and some died. These events conrm to situation happening at other places. Summary of the article: This article is the description of facts that occurred in an urban community concerning Covid 19 disease. There are 4,105 families in this community. Our leader announced the nationwide “Stay indoors” order to contain the spread of Covid 19 disease in the middle of March, 2021. Our community knew very little of this disease till then. There are ordinary daily wage earners, semiskilled persons, skilled persons, ofce goers and retired individuals besides women and children in this locality. Those individuals doing essential services like banking, healthcare, and grocery moved out for their work. These were the rst persons to get Covid disease in the month of June. Following this incident, their family members tested positive and many people were conrmed of the disease. The government took the responsibility of treatment, tracing, and testing. Also there were elaborate guidelines how people should behave during this period. The people in the community are also endowed with senses, they observed life as it went by , adhered to the guidelines announced, made adequate changes in their behaviour, pooled their resources, shared the resources, distanced the diseased and lived the life. In the time frame of one year did all the individuals get the Covid disease? How many contacted the disease? How many recovered from the disease? How many died due to the disease, is the main topic of this article.

Health service use of Australian unemployment and disability benefit recipients: a national, cross-sectional study

BackgroundHealthcare is funded and delivered separately from income support programs such as unemployment and disability benefits. Greater understanding of the health service use (HSU) of benefit recipients would support more effective design and delivery of health and income support programs. This study aimed to characterise the HSU of disability and unemployment benefit recipients relative to people earning wages, while controlling for personal, household and health-related factors associated with HSU in benefit recipients.MethodsA cross-sectional national survey of 9110 working age Australian adults in three groups: (1) 566 receiving the disability support pension (DSP); (2) 410 receiving unemployment benefits; and (3) 8134 earning wages. Outcomes included prevalence and frequency of health professional consultations, hospital attendance and admission in the past 12 months, as well as medication and supplement use in the past 2 weeks. Analyses compared DSP and unemployment benefit recipients to wage earners using prevalence ratios and incident rate ratios, adjusted for predisposing, enabling and need factors that may affect HSU.ResultsIn adjusted regression models, both DSP and unemployment benefit recipients were significantly more likely than wage earners to have consulted psychologists and social workers. DSP recipients also reported a significantly higher prevalence of consultations with General Practitioners (GPs), specialist physicians and podiatrists.. Both groups reported significantly more frequent consultations with GPs and DSP recipients with specialists. No differences were observed between groups for hospital attendance or admission, or supplement use in fully adjusted models, though the DSP group reported more prevalent medication use than wage earners. Inclusion of confounders including self-assessed health, disability severity, health insurance status, and financial resources attenuated the relationship between benefit receipt and HSU, however significant associations were still observed.ConclusionsPeople receiving unemployment and disability insurance benefits use significantly more health services than wage earners. A range of personal and clinical characteristics explained much, but not all, of the association between greater HSU and benefit receipt. Greater coordination between health and income support systems may improve health, reduce HSU and improve work ability in unemployed and working age people.

Health-Related Risk Perceptions and Wage Compensation: Evidence from Turkey

In this paper, we estimate wage compensation of workers facing different risks adversely affecting their health and well-being based on individual evaluations of work environment by using the ad-hoc module of 2013 Household Labor Survey. Our results reveal that among various risk factors, only general risk of injury is compensated by a significant and positive premium. Informal workers and female wage earners do not receive additional payment working in risky environments. Allowing risk compensation to vary across wage dispersion, we find that positive compensations follow an inverse-u shape. We argue that in terms of unpleasant job attributes, the labor market in Turkey can be identified with labor segmentation rather compensating wage differentials.

Earnings gap between men and women in the informal labor market in Cameroon

AbstractThis paper investigates the extent of gender earnings gap among informal labor market workers in Cameroon. We have used the 2010 employment and informal sector survey, the Heckman two‐step bivariate selection model, and the Neuman–Oaxaca–Ransom decomposition framework to address these concerns. We find that, compared to men, women are more likely to make the joint decision of participating in the labor market and choosing informal work. Findings also reveal that among informal workers, male workers have an earnings premium over their female counterparts. Returns to informal labor market experience are solidly consistent in narrowing the gender earnings gap. Among the self‐employed workers, male workers also enjoy an earnings premium. However, when the inverse Mills ratio is decomposed, the overall and the self‐employed gender discrimination virtually disappears. Meanwhile, female wage earners enjoy a wage premium and have an unambiguous education‐based advantage over their male counterparts. The implications of these findings support the wisdom that promoting the human capital development of the girl child would play a vital role in alleviating gender‐based differentials by eroding sociocultural conventions and advancing women's agency.

A Case for Abandoning the Federal Minimum Wage

For the past few years there has been a call to raise the Federal Minimum Wage to $15.00 per hour. The purpose of this article is to remind the reader that a wage earner receives the higher of the Federal, State, City, and in many cases the private sector company’s minimum wage. But more importantly, this article displays in chart form the strong correlation between each state’s cost of living and its minimum wage. Given the strong disparity in the cost of living amongst our 50 states, one can logically conclude that the imposition of a Federal “one-size-fits-all” minimum wage is probably inappropriate and that the minimum wage decision should be disaggregated to the States, Cities and Local Municipalities.

COVID‐19 and the Future of Management Studies. Insights from Leading Scholars

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic and its medical, social and economic impacts presented profound challenges to business, government, and society It also presents management scholars with an opportunity to rethink some of our core assumptions and directions of our research In response, in the Summer of 2020, in our capacity as co- General Editors of the Journal of Management Studies, one of the foremost academic journals of management and organization studies, we commissioned short commentaries from leading management scholars

Cost-effectiveness analysis of a supported employment intervention for people with mood and anxiety disorders in Denmark – the IPS-MA intervention

Objectives We aimed to investigate the cost-utility and cost-effectiveness of a modified Individual Placement and Support intervention for people with mood and anxiety disorders (IPS-MA). Methods Costs were assessed from a societal perspective. Health care costs were derived from registers and combined with data on use of IPS-MA services, municipal social care, and labour market services. EQ-5D was used to compute QALY. Missing data were imputed in a sensitivity analysis. We also computed the cost per gain in hours worked. Incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICER) were computed and bootstrapped to obtain confidence intervals for QALY and gain in hours worked. Results We found no difference in overall costs between groups. A significant saving was found in use of labour market services in the IPS-MA group. But the IPS-MA group had significantly lower wage earnings compared to the control group. The intervention group had a higher, though statistically in-significant, increase in QALYs than the control group. The ICER did not show statistically significant results, but there was a tendency, that IPS-MA could have a positive effect on health-related quality of life without any additional costs. However, participants in the IPS-MA group had a significantly lower gain in hours worked compared to the control group. Conclusions Despite a significant saving in use of labour market services, IPS-MA was not cost-effective. Participants in the IPS-MA group worked significantly fewer hours and earned significantly less than participants in the control group at 1-year follow-up.

Analysis of Patient Income in the 5 Years Following a Fracture Treated Surgically

Orthopedic injury is assumed to bear negative socioeconomic consequences. However, the magnitude and duration of a fracture's impact on patient income and social insurance benefits remain poorly quantified. To characterize the association between orthopedic injury and patient income using state tax records. This cohort study included adult patients surgically treated for an orthopedic fracture at a US academic trauma center from January 2003 through December 2014. Hospital data were linked to individual-level state tax records using a difference-in-differences analysis performed from November 2019 through August 2020. The control group comprised of data resampled from fracture patients at least 6 years prior to injury. An operatively treated fracture of the appendicular skeleton. The primary outcome was individual annual earnings up to 5 years postinjury. Secondary outcomes included annual household income and US Social Security benefits for 5 years postinjury and catastrophic wage loss within 2 years of injury. A total of 9997 fracture patients (mean [SD] age, 44.6 [18.9] years; 6725 [67.3%] men) to 34 570 prefracture control participants (mean [SD] age, 40.0 [20.5] years; 21 666 [62.7%] men). The median (interquartile range) of preinjury wage earnings was $16 847 ($0 to $52 221). The mean annual decline in individual earnings during the 5 years following injury was $9865 (95% CI, -$10 686 to -$8862). Annual household income declined by $5259 (95% CI, -$6337 to -$4181) over the same period. A fracture was associated with a $206 (95% CI, $147 to $265) mean annual increase in Social Security benefits in the 5 years after injury. An injury increased the risk of catastrophic wage loss by 11.6% (95% CI, 10.5% to 12.7%). Substantial relative income loss was observed in patients with preinjury earnings in the top 3 quartiles, but changes in income were negligible for patients with preinjury earnings in the bottom quartile (19%; 95% CI, -4% to 48%). In this cohort study of patients surgically treated for an orthopedic fracture at a US academic trauma center, fractures were associated with substantial individual and household income loss up to 5 years after injury, and 1 in 5 patients sustained catastrophic income loss in the 2 years after fracture. Gains in Social Security benefits offset less than 10% of annual income losses.

Intertemporal Labor Supply Substitution? Evidence from the Swiss Income Tax Holidays

This paper estimates intertemporal labor supply responses to two-year long income tax holidays staggered across Swiss cantons. Cantons shifted from an income tax system based on the previous two years’ income to a standard annual pay as you earn system, leaving two years of income untaxed. We find significant but quantitatively very small responses of wage earnings with an intertemporal elasticity of 0.025 overall. High wage income earners and especially the self-employed display larger responses with elasticities around 0.1 and 0.25, respectively, most likely driven by tax avoidance. We find no effects along the extensive margin at all. (JEL H24, H26, J22, J23, J31, R23)

Development Acceleration - A Practical Methodology

Motivated by my assignments with international Socio-Economic development institutions, and accredited scholarly associations, I developed a thirst to design a practical model to accelerate the pace of development of the third world nations. The prime Economic classification of the nations are Developed or Developing or Under In the history, we are yet to see a country in the developing and under-developed category, moving upward into a developed status. This stagnated condition of the world nations was correctly identified and questioned by the Nobel Laureate in Economics (1979), Sir. Arthur Lewis (1915-1991) as ”Is the dependence of the developing country world growth on that of the developed - world inevitable ?. Development is found to be directly related to the savings among domestic households. Saving in turn, depends of the cost of essentials needs, namely Food, Shelter and Clothing. People migrate towards nations providing a saving platform. Nations should attract the Domestic savings, and use for development. This calls for an approach to the investment of domestic saving and technology-skill tie-up chains. Also a current trend among the developing nations is to attract foreign multinational investment in their nations with many economic incentives. This is another form of dependence and tie-up with profit oriented corporate units, providing only large volume employment and without any mandatory commitment to upgrade the domestic techno-commercial and economic infrastructure. This also warrants a domestication approach to reduce the dependence on external tie-ups. A review of the seven sequential steps of corporate operations confirm a Closed Cycle Economics, operating in all the nations, irrespective of their political pattern, and controlled by three resource dimensions. In each of these steps, these three components are existing in different forms, This cycle controls and monitors the Domestic consumption, Domestic investments, the economic indicators and hence the GDP. With these thoughts as a basis for discussion, the need for a new dimensional approach was exposed to a team of 14 diversified, but critically responsible persons in different nations, committed and working towards an accelerated Socio-Economic development. Based on all these approaches, this Geometric model is developed. This model using Geometry to the faculty of Economic Science, attempts to make this linkage more eternal than inevitable. This needs a multi-lateral approach to boost the domestic savings to support domestic investments, and to improve the quality of domestic human potential to man the domestic technology. Both these should be maintained and monitored by the optimum infrastructure mix. Techno-commercial systems assist to reduce the effects of these constraints, develop the technology, and optimise the resource utilisation. This model is developed in the form of two intersecting circles, one linking the domestic savings with the domestic investments, and the other linking the domestic human potential with the domestic technology. The former represents the external entrepreneurial activity, designated as Exogenous, and the latter involving internal productive activity, designated as Endogenous. A geometric approach is used to solve these two intersecting circles, aiming towards the central objectives of integrating the Exogenous and Endogenous aspects. This will upgrade the socio-economic status, and enlarge the qualitative and quantitative outputs. The inference derived from the geometric solution indicate that, the attempts to accelerate the pace of socio-economic development should be to encourage equal efforts in both the domestic investments through domestic savings, and utilisation of domestic skills for the domestic technology, updating towards the latest in the world developments. Any attempt to upgrade the existing Endogenous aspect only or Exogenous aspect only, is bound to create an unfavourable disturbance in this synchronisation. The qualitative and quantitative dimensions of the economy could be improved by expanding the operating dimensions in the Endogenous and Exogenous aspects, in equal magnitude. The past and current experiences of the developing and the developed world, support this model solution. The unit for the measure for development is “saving” by each household, including the lowest wage earner group (labour class). The Basic needs are Food (including water and milk), Clothing and Shelter. If the average monthly earnings of each household can buy their basic needs and there is a saving, it is an indicator of a developed nation. If they cannot buy their basic needs, it is a Developing nation, If the basic need items are available, it is an under developed nation. The developing and under developed nations should concentrate on the continued availability of basic needs and their monthly cost should be lesser than the average monthly earnings of every household. Attractive incentive should be provided to invest the domestic savings in Banks and Government bonds and they should be used for Domestic development projects.

Mothers\u2019 nonstandard work schedules and adolescent obesity: a population-based cross-sectional study in the Tokyo metropolitan area

BackgroundMany wage earners in developed countries have irregular shift patterns and work evenings, nights, and weekends. Some studies have demonstrated that the nonstandard work schedules of parents have adverse effects on their children’s weight, specifically leading to or worsening obesity. However, no such study has been conducted in adolescents of high school age. This study examined the association between mothers’ nonstandard work schedules and adolescent obesity.MethodsA cross-sectional study of adolescents aged 16–17 years (n = 1743) used paired matches of self-administered questionnaires for adolescents and their mothers from Tokyo, Japan. Obesity was defined by International Obesity Task Force cut-offs. Nonstandard work schedules were defined as working early mornings, nights, overnights, or weekends. Chi-square tests were conducted to examine the association between the mothers’ work schedules and their adolescent children’s poor lifestyles, overall and stratified by income levels. Then, logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine the association between mothers’ work schedules and obesity of their adolescent children, overall and stratified by income levels.ResultsOverall, 6.5% of adolescents had obesity. The prevalence of obesity was higher among adolescents from low-middle income groups (8.2%) than that among those from high-income groups (5.9%). No clear patterns were found between mothers’ work schedules and adolescents’ poor lifestyles when stratified by income levels. Mothers’ nonstandard work schedules were significantly associated with adolescent obesity (odds ratio [OR]: 1.56, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.02–2.40). However, this association was not significant after adjustment for confounders. After stratification by income levels, mothers’ nonstandard work schedules significantly associated with their children’s obesity (OR: 2.93, 95% CI: 1.45–5.92) only in high-income groups. This association remained after adjustment of the adolescents’ lifestyles and their mothers’ working hours.ConclusionsOur results suggest that mothers’ nonstandard work schedules have adverse effects on adolescent obesity only in high-income families. Low-middle income families experienced higher levels of adolescent obesity, regardless of the mothers’ work schedules. Policy makers should consider mothers’ work schedules as a factor in preventing adolescent obesity.

Social Robots as the Bride? Understanding the Construction of Gender in a Japanese Social Robot Product

This study critically investigates the construction of gender on a Japanese hologram animestyle social robot Azuma Hikari. By applying a mixed method merging the visual semiotic method and heterogeneous engineering approach in software studies, the signs in Azuma Hikari’s anthropomorphized image and the interactivity enabled by the multimedia interface have been analyzed and discussed. The analysis revealed a stereotyped representation of a Japanese “ideal bride” who should be cute, sexy, comforting, good at housework, and subordinated to “Master”-like husband. Moreover, the device interface disciplines users to play the role of “wage earner” in the simulated marriage and reconstructs the gender relations in reality. It suggests the humanization of the objects is often associated with the dehumanization and objectification of the human in reverse.

Clinicopathological Study of Change of Voice

Background: Change of voice is one of the common complaints in ENT practice and hoarseness of voice is the commonest symptom of changed voice quality. Hoarseness is invariably the earliest manifestation of conditions directly or indirectly affecting the voice apparatus. Though most common causes of hoarseness are benign and vocal abuse is the commonest among them, but we should always investigate for more sinister pathology like malignancy.
 Objectives: To find out the symptoms, signs and pathological incidence, leading to change of voice for early diagnosis and interventional purpose.
 Methods: Total 87 patients of change of voice, studied in 06 months duration from 1st January 2016 to 30th June 2016 in the Department of ENT & Head-Neck Surgery, Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Dhaka. The cases were selected according to the eligibility criteria by purposive sampling. Then the data were collected by the active participation of the patients interviewed by the preformed proforma of data collection sheet.
 Results: Maximum number of cases of change of voice were due to carcinoma larynx (37.93%), then chronic laryngitis (20.99%), followed by vocal cord nodules (19.54%) and vocal cord polyps (8.05%.). Laryngopharyngeal reflux was found in 45.95% patients of chronic laryngitis. Males were affected more than females (1.81:1). Most of the patients were in the age group of 21 to 50 years. Peak incidence was in the 4th decade. Labourers/ daily wage earners formed the predominant group. Majority of patients were from low socioeconomic class. Smoking, vocal abuse, smoking and infections were the common predisposing factors.
 Conclusion: Hoarseness of voice is just a symptom with a very diverse etiology. The etiological data varies in different geographical location and from one center to other, so every case should be carefully and thoroughly evaluated to know the diagnosis and underlying pathology for early and prompt management.
 J Dhaka Medical College, Vol. 29, No.2, October, 2020, Page 116-125

International Remittances Literature: A Study in Bangladesh during the period of 1971-2020

Remittance has become a major contributor to the Bangladeshi economy. As the emigrant workers from Bangladesh gradually increased over the years, the amount of annual remittance to the country significantly rose. In 1974, Wage Earners' Scheme was initiated in order to help the Non-resident Bangladeshis remit their earnings home through legal channels. The scheme soon became popular among the Bangladeshis working abroad. Some $11.8 million was remitted to Bangladesh in the fiscal year of 1974–75. The amount rose to over $350 million in the fiscal year of 1980-81 and to over $750 million in the fiscal year of 1990–91. Remittance is sent formally through various ways such as demand draft, traveler's check, telegraphic transfer, postal order, direct transfer, Automatic Teller Machine. etc. Hundi or money carrier system is prevalent as informal process of remittance sending in most cases. The most popular reasons behind the preference towards Hundi system is the absence of any transaction charges, its fast delivery and the opportunity to maintain confidentiality. This research paper is designed to provide an illustrated account of what kind of research has been done on these remittances at home and abroad over the past fifty years.

Scaling of Inequality: Urbanization Favors High Wage Earners

As cities increase in size, total wages grow superlinearly, meaning that average wages are higher in larger cities. This phenomenon, known as the urban wage premium, supports the notion that urbanization and the growth of cities contribute positively to human well-being. However, it remains unclear how the distribution of wages changes as cities grow. Here we segment the populations of U.S. cities into wage deciles and determine the scaling coefficient of each bracket's aggregate wages versus city size. We find that, while total wages of all these categories grow superlinearly with city size, the effect is uneven, with total wages of the highest wage earners growing faster than all other wage brackets. We show that this is partly due to the predominance of high-wage jobs in larger cities. Thus, the effects of urbanization are mixed -- it brings higher average wages but with increasing inequality, thus inhibiting prospects for long-term sustainability.

Does the COVID-19 Pandemic Shock Change the Reservation Wage?

The COVID-19 pandemic can change the reservation wage because of changes in people’s preferences due to the risk of infection, the rapid rise of work at home, or a worsened household economy. Furthermore, the changing reservation wage changes the decision to work, especially for the second wage earner. This study examines the effect of the pandemic shock on the reservation wage using the difference-in-differences method and Japanese data about job seekers’ desired wage. We find that after the first wave of the pandemic, the reservation wages for part-time (full-time) job increase (decrease) in urban prefectures. Especially, the reservation wages for part-time managerial (construction and mining) occupations increase (decrease). These managerial jobs include managing shops like restaurants and bars, where it is difficult to maintain sales during pandemic and a high risk of infection exists. People may not prefer these aspects. In contrast, the pandemic shock worsened the household economy. This may decrease the reservation wage in jobs where money is received instantly, such as part-time construction and mining jobs. Finally, contrary to our expectation, the reservation wage of professional jobs that seem to be familiar with work at home does not decrease. Furthermore, the decrease in reservation wages in the prior period increases the labor market participation rate.

Incidence and Length of Sickness Absence among Hierarchical Occupational Classes and Non-Wage-Earners: A Register Study of 1.6 Million Finns.

Socioeconomic differences in sickness absence are well known, but previous studies have tended to focus on wage earners only. This study examined incidence and length of sickness absence comparing the employee groups of upper and lower non-manual employees and manual workers, but also entrepreneurs, the unemployed and other non-wage-earners. The study utilized register data on a nationally representative 70% sample of Finns aged 25–62 at the end of year 2012 (N = 1,615,352). Sickness absence spells compensated by sickness allowance and initiated during 2013 were retrieved from the register of the Social Insurance Institution of Finland (SIIF) and followed until the end of each episode and linked to socio-demographic covariates collected from the registers of the SIIF and of Statistics Finland. Zero-inflated negative binomial regression was used in multivariate models. After adjusting for age, marital status, region and income, there were clear differences in the occurrence and length of sickness absence across socioeconomic groups. Compared to upper non-manual employees, lower non-manual employees and especially manual workers had higher cumulative annual incidence of sickness absence among both men and women, but the entrepreneurs, the unemployed and other non-wage-earners had a clearly higher expected number of sickness absence days. Results varied by diagnostic group. The results highlight the importance of different types of preventive measures for reducing the occurrence of sickness absence and for preventing prolongations of sickness absence spells in different socioeconomic groups.