Carol Scotese

Working papers

• The specifics of non-routine task changes: a granular approach

Automation technology has shifted employment into non-routine work and has been linked to employment polarization. This paper estimates  granular specific non-routine tasks and examines employment shifts across those tasks. The analysis finds that employment shifts into decision-making, technology, and information related tasks account for 90% of the high-wage employment growth. The task granularity reveals non-routine abstract tasks are performed intensively in a range of skill environments and that non-college men have experienced deskilling not only out of routine work, but also out of several non-routine abstract tasks. This is potentially linked to the decline in supervisory employment.  Also, task reallocation differs for men relative to women, with both non-college and college educated women expanding into a wider array of non-routine abstract tasks relative to their male counterparts. 

• Where have all the (boomer) routine workers gone?

This paper examines the employment outcomes of a cohort of non-college educated individuals who exit employment from occupations most exposed to automation risk. The analysis employs a novel set of granular task measures  estimated from the detailed job attributes in the Occupational Information Network (O*NET).  The granularity enables a rich characterization of non-routine work and task mobility choices for those without a college degree. The data yield multiple types of interpersonal, decision-making, cognitive, and technical tasks. Employing the granular tasks to analyze the employment outcomes for non-college educated workers who transition out of routine work, this study finds that (1) the granular measures detect abstract tasks performed intensively in a range of skill contexts, (2) when exiting routine intensive work, the non-college propensity to enter abstract work is just under 65%, and (3) approximately 26% of those switches are associated with wage gains.

Publications

• • “War Mobilization and the Great Compression,” The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis and Policy. Volume 10, Issue 1 ISSN 1935-1682, July 2010.

  •  “Evidence on the Demographic Transition,” Review of Economics and Statistics, November (2009), 871-887.

  • “Fertility and Government Spending on Education at Different Levels of Development” (2004) in  Economic Growth and Human Capital (eds., M. Boldrin and P. Wang) with Theodore Palivos.

  • “Fertility and Education Premiums,” Journal of Population Economics (2003), 555–578.

  • “Comparative Advantage, Trade, and Transboundary Pollution” Open Economies Review (July 2000) with John W. Maxwell. 

  • “Dynamic Effects of Financial Intermediation over the Business Cycle”, Economic Inquiry 38, (January 2000) 34-57; with Ping Wang. 

  • “Banking on Fewer Children: Financial Intermediation, Fertility and Economic Development,” Journal of Population Economics 12 (December 1999) 567-590. 

  • “Fertility, Growth and the Financing of Public Education and Health”, Journal of Population Economics 9, (November 1996) 415-428; with Theodore Palivos. 

  • “Can Government Enforcement Permanently Alter Fertility?: The Case of China”; Economic Inquiry 33, (October 1995) 552-570; with Ping Wang. 

  • “Fertility Choice and Economic Growth: Theory and Evidence”: The Review of Economics and Statistics 76, (May 1994), 255-266; with Ping Wang and Chong Yip. 

  • “Forecast Smoothing and the Optimal Under-utilization of Information at the Federal Reserve”: Journal of Macroeconomics 16, (Fall 1994) 653-670.

Work in progress

• Labor force participation and task specific human capital