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Essays on Labor Economics and Human Capital Development /

Record Type:	Electronic resources : Monograph/item
Title/Author:	Essays on Labor Economics and Human Capital Development // Marcos Ceron Molina.
Author:	Ceron Molina, Marcos,
Description:	1 electronic resource (257 pages)
Notes:	Source: Dissertations Abstracts International, Volume: 86-01, Section: B.
Contained By:	Dissertations Abstracts International86-01B.
Subject:	Home economics. -
Online resource:	https://pqdd.sinica.edu.tw/twdaoapp/servlet/advanced?query=31334707
ISBN:	9798383194164

Essays on Labor Economics and Human Capital Development /
Ceron Molina, Marcos,

Essays on Labor Economics and Human Capital Development /Marcos Ceron Molina. - 1 electronic resource (257 pages)

Source: Dissertations Abstracts International, Volume: 86-01, Section: B.

This dissertation consists of three independent chapters on labor economics and human capital development. In the first chapter, I provide evidence that firms in Brazil, one of the largest developing economies globally, exercise significant labor market power. Employing a comprehensive administrative dataset covering nearly the entire formal sector, I explore the relationship between employer concentration and wages within the tradable sector over the period 1995-2015. The identification strategy exploits within firm-year variation, by comparing average wages among multiple establishments of the same parent firm, each located in distinct microregions. The analysis reveals four principal findings. First, labor markets, defined as the interaction of industries and microregions, are highly concentrated, with average levels of concentration surpassing the usual threshold for high concentration. Second, I found that establishments operating in more concentrated labor markets pay, on average, lower wages. In particular, according to my preferred specification, transitioning from the 25th percentile to the median of the distribution of the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) of employment across labor markets would lead to a reduction of approximately 5% in wages. Third, I observe that employees at the lower end of a firm's wage distribution are less impacted by market power, suggesting that minimum wage laws may mitigate some effects of employer concentration. Finally, in exercises simulating horizontal mergers between the two largest employers in each labor market, the simulations indicate that such mergers would result in wage decreases of around 2%, based on our preferred estimates.In the second chapter, I estimate the technology governing the production human capital, encompassing cognitive skills and health, throughout childhood and early adolescence in Mexico. The objective is to understand how these human capital components are jointly shaped during these pivotal stages and identify the primary determinants influencing their development. My findings reveal that both health and cognitive skills exhibit self-productivity, indicating significant persistence over time. Moreover, adverse health conditions during early stages can adversely affect the development of cognitive skills in subsequent periods. Furthermore, the results underscore the crucial role of parental investments in shaping both child health and cognitive skills, with a particularly pronounced impact on the latter. Additionally, there is evidence of complementarity between parental investments and children's human capital, indicating that investments yield greater returns for children with higher existing levels of human capital. Moreover, the analysis suggests that improved sanitation services may enhance human capital production, primarily through the health component, especially during early developmental stages. These findings highlight the potential long-term consequences of early human capital deficiencies and emphasize the urgency of timely interventions.Finally, the third chapter investigates how changes in labor market dynamics among women and men influence their fertility decisions in Brazil. To address endogeneity concerns between employment rates and fertility decisions, I construct indices of gender-specific labor demand (Bartik, 1991) as instruments for our employment rate measures. My results can be summarized in three key points. First, I find that, as predicted by the neoclassical theory of fertility, improved labor market conditions for women are associated with a decreased likelihood of having a child and a reduction in the total number of children, particularly at later stages of the fertility life, while improved labor market conditions for men have the opposite effect. Second, my analysis reveals that the impact of employment on fertility is primarily observed at the intensive margin rather than at the extensive margin, as the decision to have a child for the first time remains unaffected when labor market conditions improve. Finally, I find that better labor market conditions for women not only lead to lower fertility rates but also result in improved human capital outcomes for their children, supporting the notion of a trade-off between the quantity and quality of children.

English

ISBN: 9798383194164Subjects--Topical Terms:

551902
Home economics.
Subjects--Index Terms:

Concentration

Essays on Labor Economics and Human Capital Development /
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520 $a This dissertation consists of three independent chapters on labor economics and human capital development. In the first chapter, I provide evidence that firms in Brazil, one of the largest developing economies globally, exercise significant labor market power. Employing a comprehensive administrative dataset covering nearly the entire formal sector, I explore the relationship between employer concentration and wages within the tradable sector over the period 1995-2015. The identification strategy exploits within firm-year variation, by comparing average wages among multiple establishments of the same parent firm, each located in distinct microregions. The analysis reveals four principal findings. First, labor markets, defined as the interaction of industries and microregions, are highly concentrated, with average levels of concentration surpassing the usual threshold for high concentration. Second, I found that establishments operating in more concentrated labor markets pay, on average, lower wages. In particular, according to my preferred specification, transitioning from the 25th percentile to the median of the distribution of the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) of employment across labor markets would lead to a reduction of approximately 5% in wages. Third, I observe that employees at the lower end of a firm's wage distribution are less impacted by market power, suggesting that minimum wage laws may mitigate some effects of employer concentration. Finally, in exercises simulating horizontal mergers between the two largest employers in each labor market, the simulations indicate that such mergers would result in wage decreases of around 2%, based on our preferred estimates.In the second chapter, I estimate the technology governing the production human capital, encompassing cognitive skills and health, throughout childhood and early adolescence in Mexico. The objective is to understand how these human capital components are jointly shaped during these pivotal stages and identify the primary determinants influencing their development. My findings reveal that both health and cognitive skills exhibit self-productivity, indicating significant persistence over time. Moreover, adverse health conditions during early stages can adversely affect the development of cognitive skills in subsequent periods. Furthermore, the results underscore the crucial role of parental investments in shaping both child health and cognitive skills, with a particularly pronounced impact on the latter. Additionally, there is evidence of complementarity between parental investments and children's human capital, indicating that investments yield greater returns for children with higher existing levels of human capital. Moreover, the analysis suggests that improved sanitation services may enhance human capital production, primarily through the health component, especially during early developmental stages. These findings highlight the potential long-term consequences of early human capital deficiencies and emphasize the urgency of timely interventions.Finally, the third chapter investigates how changes in labor market dynamics among women and men influence their fertility decisions in Brazil. To address endogeneity concerns between employment rates and fertility decisions, I construct indices of gender-specific labor demand (Bartik, 1991) as instruments for our employment rate measures. My results can be summarized in three key points. First, I find that, as predicted by the neoclassical theory of fertility, improved labor market conditions for women are associated with a decreased likelihood of having a child and a reduction in the total number of children, particularly at later stages of the fertility life, while improved labor market conditions for men have the opposite effect. Second, my analysis reveals that the impact of employment on fertility is primarily observed at the intensive margin rather than at the extensive margin, as the decision to have a child for the first time remains unaffected when labor market conditions improve. Finally, I find that better labor market conditions for women not only lead to lower fertility rates but also result in improved human capital outcomes for their children, supporting the notion of a trade-off between the quantity and quality of children.
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653 $a Labor markets
653 $a Trade-off
653 $a Parental investments
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792 $a 2024
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