Economía Laboral

his working paper explores the effect of joint labor decisions on the study of wage regression models. The estimation of Mincer equations suffers from numerous sources of bias, including the sample selection problem generated by the fact that the agent decision to work is not independent of the wage. Most of the papers corrects this bias using a model of individual labor participation. However, recent trends in the labor market show greater participation of women in the labor force and seem to indicate that the joint decision of the spouses is increasingly relevant in determining the selection mechanism.

We estimated the impact of the minimum wage on wages, unemployment, and formal-informal sector mobility for women in the domestic-work sector in Uruguay. Applying the density-discontinuity design developed by Jales (2017), we used cross-sectional data for the period 2006–2016 from the National Household Survey and found that the minimum wage had significant effects on labor outcomes, with almost 20% of women increasing their wages to reach the minimum. This effect was observed in both the formal and informal sector, though the latter was not covered by the policy. We also showed a decline in employment in the domestic sector as well as a significant effect on formal-informal sector mobility with negative impacts on formal employment. We present suggestive evidence those effects were offset by other labor policies undertaken in the analysis period.

For some entities, the utility-maximizing evasion rate depends substantially on tax audit features, such as audit probabilities and penalty rates. Bergolo et al. (2017) document large misperceptions about these features. In this paper, we expand the analysis of survey data to explore potential sources of these misperceptions. Of all the channels that we explore, recent contact with audits best explains differences in misperceptions.

Continuous treatments (e.g., doses) arise often in practice. Methods for estimation and inference for quantile treatment effects models with a continuous treatment are proposed. Identification of the parameters of interest, the dose-response functions and the quantile treatment effects, is achieved under the assumption that selection to treatment is based on observable characteristics. An easy to implement semiparametric two-step estimator, where the first step is based on a flexible Box–Cox model is proposed. Uniform consistency and weak convergence of this estimator are established. Practical statistical inference procedures are developed using bootstrap...

This paper proposes a simple hierarchical model and a testing strategy to identify intra-cluster correlations, in the form of nested random effects and serially correlated error components. We focus on intra-cluster serial correlation at different nested levels, a topic that has not been studied in the literature before. A Neyman’s framework is used to derive LM-type tests that allow researchers to identify the appropriate level of clustering as well as the type of intra-group correlation. An extensive Monte Carlo exercise shows that the proposed tests perform well in finite samples and under non-Gaussian distributions.

This paper develops generalized method of moments-based (GMM-based) Lagrange multiplier tests for nonlinear hypotheses that are robust to locally misspecified possibly nonlinear alternatives. The procedure is based on an initial consistent GMM estimator of the parameters under a given set of nonlinear restrictions. The new test for one particular set of nonlinear hypotheses is consistent and has correct asymptotic size independently of whether the other, also nonlinear hypotheses, are correct or locally misspecified. To illustrate the usefulness of our proposed tests we consider testing rational expectations hypotheses using U.S. data.

The disincentive effects of social assistance programs on registered (or formal) employment are a first-order policy concern in developing and middle-income countries. We study the impact of a conditional cash transfer (CCT) program in Uruguay on the employment of adult members in beneficiary households in a context of high informality. Our research design relies on the sharp discontinuity introduced by program eligibility rules around a poverty score threshold combined with longitudinal administrative data. We find reductions of about 6 percentage points (a 13% drop) in formal labor force participation among all beneficiaries and of 8.7 percentage points (a 19% drop) for single mothers. The implied elasticity of participation in the formal sector with respect to the net-of-tax rate is about 0.78 for the full sample and about 1.3 for single mothers...

Two interesting facts emerge from the Palestinian labour market. Educational attainment for women swiftly expanded during the 1999–2011 period, but the labour force participation rate for educated women stagnated––disproportionately so for young educated women. We investigate whether changes in labour demand has contributed to women’s sluggish labour force participation. Our empirical analysis used quarterly labour-force data published by Palestine Central Bureau of Statistics between 2005 and 2011. To explore the causal effect of labour demand shocks, we use Bartik instrumental variable approach. Our analysis provides evidence that changes in the labour demand for educated women, rather than improvement in overall demand, affect their labour force participation. This research has important policy implications regarding the economic empowerment of educated women in Palestine suggesting that improvement in overall demand may not benefit educated women and that boosting demand for this specific cohort is what matters.