Working Papers
Separations, Ex-Ante Heterogeneity and Labour Market Dynamics with Christian Merkl. (Accepted, Journal of Monetary Economics) [FAU Working Paper]
Our paper documents the importance of workers' ex-ante heterogeneity for labor market dynamics and for the composition of the unemployment pool. We show that workers with high wages have both lower separation rates and larger log-deviations of these separations over the business cycle than those with low wages. Thereby, more high-wage workers enter the unemployment pool in recessions, leading to a positive correlation between unemployment and the prior wage of those losing their job. Based on administrative data for Germany and two-way fixed effects, we show that worker fixed effects are key for the documented facts. We contrast our empirical results with a search and matching model with worker ex-ante productivity heterogeneity. The simulated model can replicate the empirical facts when calibrated to the measured flow rates and to the relative residual wage dispersion from the administrative data for different wage groups. It is the combination of low steady state separation rates and low residual wage dispersion for high-wage workers that generates the patterns documented in the data.
The cost of job loss in carbon-intensive sectors: Evidence from Germany with Robert Grundke and Ze`ev Krill. (R&R at Journal of Public Economics) [OECD Working Paper] [Current Draft]
Using German administrative data, we estimate the cost of involuntary job displacement for workers in high- and low-carbon-intensity sectors. We find that displaced workers from high carbon-intensity sectors have, on average, higher earnings losses after job displacement, which according to our results is mainly due to human capital specificity, the regional clustering of carbon-intensive activities and higher wage premia in carbon-intensive firms. Workers displaced in high carbon-intensity sectors have fewer outside options for finding jobs with similar skill requirements, face higher local labor market concentration and have a higher probability to switch occupations, sectors, and local labor markets after displacement.
Firms and the Gender Wage Gap: A Comparison of Eleven Countries with Marco G. Palladino, Antoine Bertheau, Alexander Hijzen, Astrid Kunze, Dogan Gülümser, Marta Lachowska, Anne Sophie Lassen, Salvatore Lattanzio, Benjamin Lochner, Stefano Lombardi, Jordy Meekes, Balazs Murakozy and Oskar Skans. [Draft available soon]
We quantify the role of gender-specific firm wage premiums in explaining the private-sector gender gap in hourly wages using a harmonized research design across 11 matched employer-employee datasets — ten European countries and Washington State, USA. These premiums explain the gender gap when women are less likely to work at high-paying firms (sorting) or receive lower premiums than men within the same firm (pay-setting). We find that firm wage premiums account for a substantial share of variation in gender wage gaps, ranging from 15 to 32 percent. While both mechanisms matter, sorting is the predominant driver of the firm contribution to the gender wage gap in most countries. Three patterns are broadly consistent: (1) women sorting into lower-paying firms becomes increasingly pronounced with age; (2) women are more concentrated in low-paying firms with a high share of part-time workers; and (3) pay-setting gaps are largest in high-wage firms, where women receive about 90 percent of the rents men receive from firm surplus gains.
Work-in-progress
Job Loss in High-Emission Industries (with Stefano Lombardi, Alexander Hijzen and the LinkEED team).
The Role of Firms for the Integration of Migrants Across Countries (with Jaime Arellano-Bover, Ana Damas de Matos, Alexander Hijzen and the LinkEED team).
Dormant work
Sovereign Defaults and Internal Conflict (draft available upon request).
Publications
The Civic Engagement and Social Integration of Refugees in Germany (with Paul Berbée, Katia Gallegos-Torres, Martin Lange and Katrin Sommerfeld).