THE TIMING OF EXEMPTIONS FROM WELFARE WORK REQUIREMENTS AND ITS EFFECTS ON MOTHERS' WORK AND WELFARE RECEIPT AROUND CHILDBIRTH

I quantify the effects of welfare work exemptions on women's labor force participation and welfare receipt. This study, which also examines the age of youngest child (AYC) exemption, is the first to investigate the pregnancy exemption. Between‐state and within‐state variations in exemption length allow me to estimate the heterogeneous effects of each exemption by its timing and strictness. I find that the effects on labor force participation are driven by employment for the pregnancy exemption, inducing relatively stable welfare receipts. In contrast, the effects are driven by unemployment for the AYC exemption, which triggers more reliance on welfare after birth. (JEL I38)     

ENTITLEMENT EFFECTS, UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE AND EMPLOYMENT DECISIONS

Many studies have identified the work disincentive effects of unemployment insurance. This paper points out the entitlement effect of this and other social insurance programs on employment, as the risks of labor-market participation are reduced by the existence of unemployment benefits. This employment-increasing effect can offset the disincentive effect, with the net impact on employment becoming an empirical issue. Using data on a sample of married women for 1971, we find that on net there is a slight negative effect on employment of higher unemployment insurance benefits. The entitlement effect on employment is, though, generally positive and significant, suggesting that the provisions of social insurance induce increased labor-force participation among women who otherwise would remain out of the labor force.     

EFFECTS OF WELFARE REFORM ON ILLICIT DRUG USE OF ADULT WOMEN

Exploiting changes in welfare policy across states and over time and comparing relevant population subgroups within an econometric difference‐in‐differences framework, we estimate the effects of welfare reform on adult women's illicit drug use from 1992 to 2002, the period during which welfare reform unfolded in the United States. The analyses are based on all available and appropriate national data sets, each offering unique strengths and measuring a different drug‐related outcome. We investigate self‐reported illicit drug use (from the National Household Surveys on Drug Abuse and National Surveys on Drug Use and Health), drug‐related prison admissions (from the National Corrections Reporting Program), drug‐related arrests (from Federal Bureau of Investigation Uniform Crime Reports), and drug‐related emergency department episodes (from the Drug Abuse Warning Network). We find robust evidence that welfare reform led to a 10%–21% decline in illicit drug use among women at risk of relying on welfare, as well as associated declines in drug‐related arrests (6%–7%), drug‐related hospital emergency department episodes (7%–11%), and possibly drug‐related prison admissions (11%–19%). The findings indicate that an appropriately designed welfare system with sufficient job opportunities for those who are able to work can result in both increases in employment and decreases in drug use. (JEL I38, K42, J21)     

A SPATIAL PERSPECTIVE ON EUROPEAN INTEGRATION: HETEROGENEOUS WELFARE AND MIGRATION EFFECTS FROM THE SINGLE MARKET AND THE BREXIT

We use a quantitative model to study the implications of European integration for welfare and net migration flows across 1,280 European regions. The model suggests that an increase of trade barriers to the level of 1957 reduces welfare by about 5%–8% on average, depending on the presumed trade elasticity. However, remote regions may face initial welfare losses of up to 10%. These heterogeneous welfare effects cause estimated net migration of 1.9% of the population to the European geographic center implying that the dismantling of trade barriers in Europe has led to a more homogeneous spatial distribution of economic activity. With regard to the Brexit, we find moderate welfare losses for the United Kingdom of 1.05% in the most pessimistic scenario while continental Europe's welfare declines by 0.41%. (JEL F15, R12, R13, R23)     

REAL WAGE AND EMPLOYMENT UNCERTAINTY AND THE LABOR FORCE PARTICIPATION DECISIONS OF MARRIED WOMEN

This paper argues that an important factor in a married woman's decision to enter the labor force is the degree of uncertainty associated with expectations offuture wages and (husband's) income, and that high levels of uncertainty during the 1970s may have contributed substantially to the growth in participation in that decade. We apply a model of autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity to aggregate time series data to measure the level of uncertainty in each period. Our estimates support our hypothesis that the level of uncertainty is an important determinant of labor force participation for married women.     

ON THE HETEROGENEOUS EMPLOYMENT EFFECTS OF OFFSHORING: IDENTIFYING PRODUCTIVITY AND DOWNSIZING CHANNELS

This article examines the channels through which offshoring affects employment in a representative sample of German establishments, using a difference‐in‐differences matching approach. Offshoring is measured by an increase in the share of foreign to total intermediate inputs at the plant‐level. We identify a positive productivity effect and isolate a negative downsizing effect from offshoring on employment, by exploiting differences between offshoring plants that do and do not simultaneously restructure. Furthermore, we cannot find evidence of negative indirect employment effects on domestic suppliers or competitors. (JEL F16, J23, F23, C21)     

EFFECTS OF RESIDENTIAL SEGREGATION AND NEIGHBORHOOD OPPORTUNITY STRUCTURE ON THE EMPLOYMENT OF BLACK AND WHITE YOUTH

The object of this article is to consider the impact of local labor market opportunities on the employment of youth, and to evaluate the extent to which residential segregation is detrimental to the employment of young blacks. In the study, labor force statistics for white and black youth are related to job availability estimates derived from Dun and Bradstreet business data for 74 neighborhood communities in the city of Chicago. The findings underscore the unique role of local labor markets, especially for youth enrolled in school. Job availability has a strong impact on the employment ratio of blacks, but affects the employment of white youth only slightly. It appears, however, that when job availability is controlled, blacks benefit somewhat from segregation. The implications for job redistribution and its possible effect on the racial employment gap are discussed.     

THE EFFECTS OF EMPLOYMENT WHILE PREGNANT ON HEALTH AT BIRTH

Today, many pregnant women take a brief period of time off work to give birth. This article explores the effects of pregnancy employment on health at birth. Initial results show that pregnancy employment has beneficial effects. However, these effects often become statistically insignificant when I control for earnings from pregnancy employment and when I examine women employed prior to the pregnancy and siblings in fixed effects models. I conclude that beneficial effects of pregnancy employment are due to increased family income via earnings and to unobserved heterogeneity. There is no evidence that pregnancy employment adversely affects health at birth.(JEL J1 , J2 , J3 )     

FACTOR SUBSTITUTION, RATIONAL EXPECTATIONS, AND THE EFFECTS OF COMMODITY PRICE SHOCKS ON EMPLOYMENT AND INVESTMENT

Within an aggregate model with three inputs to production, the paper studies the effects of an increase in the price of one of the inputs, called commodities. No restrictions are placed on the production possibility constraint, and expectations are assumed to be formed rationally. After considering the effects on the demand for the two remaining inputs, labor and capital, the paper analyzes the effects on employment under a wage rigidity constraint. A dynamic formulation is used to analyze the effects on investment, which are found to depend weakly and sometimes perversely on partial substitution parameters.     

EASING THE CONSTRAINTS OF MOTHERHOOD: THE EFFECTS OF ALL‐DAY SCHOOLS ON MOTHERS' LABOR SUPPLY

Low rates of female labor force participation (LFP) have been linked to the absence of childcare policies. This article examines the degree to which extending the school day by 3.5 hours in elementary schools, a large implicit childcare subsidy, affects LFP, the number of weekly hours worked, and the monthly earnings of females with elementary‐school‐age children. To do so, we exploit within‐individual variation in access to full‐time schools and a rotating panel of households that contains 12 years of individual‐level data on labor outcomes and sociodemographic characteristics. Results from long‐difference models show that extending the school day increases mothers' labor supply, increasing LFP by 5.5 percentage points and the number of weekly hours worked by 1.8. Moreover, these increases are accompanied by a raise in monthly earnings. (JEL I25, J13, J22)     

EFFECTS OF WELFARE REFORM ON WOMEN'S VOTING PARTICIPATION

This study investigates the effects of welfare reform in the United States in the 1990s on voting among low‐income women. Using the November Current Population Surveys with the added Voting and Registration Supplement for the years 1990 through 2004 and exploiting changes in welfare policy across states and over time, we estimate the causal effects of welfare reform on women's voting registration and voting participation during the period in which welfare reform unfolded. During this time period, voter turnout was decreasing in the United States. We find robust evidence that welfare reform led to smaller declines in voting (about 3 to 4 percentage points, which translates to about 10% relative to the baseline mean) for women who were exposed to welfare reform compared to several different comparison groups of similar women who were much less exposed. The robust findings suggest that welfare reform had prosocial effects on civic participation, as characterized by voting. The effects were largely confined to presidential elections, were stronger in Democratic than Republican states, were stronger in states with stronger work incentive policies, and appeared to operate through employment, education, and income. (JEL D72, H53, I38, J21)     

THE EFFECTS OF EXPORTS, PUBLIC DEBT, AND DEVELOPMENT ON INCOME INEQUALITY

Classical economics and most modernization theorists hold that a curvilinear relationship exist between income inequality and development level. In this article that relationship is tested. In addition, it is hypothesized that exports and debt as percentages of gross domestic product increases individual income inequality. Regression analyses with controls for development and time were used to test these relationships (N=28 at two time periods). To test these hypotheses with additional data a panel cross-section design was used with data for countries where it is not available a two separate times (N=37 and N=46). The results do not provide evidence to support a curvilinear relationship between development and income distribution when controls for dependency are included in the regression equation. The results from all six regressions presented support the hypothesis that exports enhance income inequality. Moreover, a covariant analysis indicates that exports effect inequality significantly more in undeveloped countries than in developed countries. It is concluded that for less developed countries pursuing export-oriented production, income does not become more evenly distributed at later stages of development.     

THE ESTIMATED EFFECT OF MATERNAL EMPLOYMENT ON CHILDREN UNDER MANDATORY AND NON-MANDATORY EMPLOYMENT CIRCUMSTANCES

Maternal employment's association with young school-age children's academic and behavioural outcomes was examined in a sample of families currently or recently receiving welfare. The sample comprised 1,197 African-American mothers and their preschool-age children who were randomly assigned either to the ‘human capital development’ (HCD) programme, the ‘labor force attachment’ (LFA) programme or to the control group in the Atlanta site of the Child Outcomes Study, a substudy of the National Evaluation of Welfare-to-Work Strategies (NEWWS). Once observed selection effects were controlled, maternal employment — regardless of whether obtained under mandatory or non-mandatory circumstances — was largely unrelated to contemporaneous measures of five to seven year olds’ academic school readiness and behaviour. There was one exception: maternal employment secured through Atlanta's HCD programme significantly predicted fewer and/or less frequent antisocial behaviours even after observed selection factors were controlled. Implications for policy and future research are discussed.     

THE EFFECT OF INSTITUTIONAL EXPENDITURES ON EMPLOYMENT OUTCOMES AND EARNINGS

In recent decades, public attention on colleges has risen in response to rising college expenditures and costs. This study uses the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 to investigate how spending impacts salaries and employment outcomes, controlling for selection. Our findings indicate that spending on instruction increases salaries, the probability of full‐time employment, and job match, particularly for more disadvantaged students, while there are smaller benefits of spending on student services for less disadvantaged students. Spending on research has large positive impacts on salary and the probability of full‐time employment, especially for disadvantaged students. (JEL I20, J24)     

THE EFFECTS OF EMPLOYMENT PROTECTION ON LABOR TURNOVER: EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE FROM TAIWAN

This paper investigates the effects of employment protection legislation on the rates of hiring, separation, worker flows, job reallocation, and churning flows for the case of Taiwan. Our empirical identification takes advantage of a reform created by Taiwan's enactment of Labor Standards Law, which has substantially increased the costs of firing, and the implementation of the law's enforcement measures. Moreover, our identification also exploits the fact that the stringency of the law's provisions and the intensity of the law's enforcement vary with establishment size. On the basis of the monthly data at the establishment level for the period 1983–1995, we find that Taiwan's Labor Standards Law and its enforcement measures have dampened labor turnover for medium‐sized and large establishments, while that of small establishments was not affected. (JEL J65, J63, J88)     

THE CREDIT‐CHANNEL TRANSMISSION MECHANISM AND THE NONLINEAR GROWTH AND WELFARE EFFECTS OF INFLATION AND TAXES

With the credit‐channel effect driven by the central bank's open market operations, this paper's model easily gives rise to the nonlinear inflation‐growth nexus, which is evidenced by a number of cross‐country empirical studies. The threshold level of the inflation rate is found to be lower when tax rates are higher. The presence of the credit‐channel effect also provides the rationale for setting positive (and smaller than 1) tax rates on consumption, labor income, and capital income. The optimal tax rates rise as the inflation target declines. Under a fiscal policy rule where labor and capital income taxes move proportionally to each other, the optimal capital income tax rate could be higher than the optimal labor income tax rate. Under a sufficiently large central bank balance sheet, the credit‐channel effect will be so weak that inflation and all kinds of taxes are growth and welfare repressing. This provides a rationale for central banks that have implemented quantitative easing policies to shrink their balance sheets. (JEL E58, E62, O42)     

EDUCATION AND POLITICAL TOLERANCE: TESTING THE EFFECTS OF COGNITIVE SOPHISTICATION AND TARGET GROUP AFFECT

This paper examines the effects of education and cognitive sophisticationon willingness to extend civil liberties to nonconformist groups.We conducted secondary analysis of the 1984 General SocietySurvey data. The results show that there is a strong tolerancedimension that cuts across groups and types of actions. We foundstrong positive effects of education on a multiple target grouptolerance scale that included both left-wing and right-winggroups. A substantial fraction of the education effect on toleranceis mediated by cognitive sophistication. The effects of educationon tolerance are strong even when a person has negative feelingstoward the target group. This paper helps identify why and when(e.g., cognitive sophistication and dislike of a target group)education enhances political tolerance. We discuss the implicationsof the research for debates on the education-tolerance relationship.     

EFFECTS OF INTERNET USE AND SOCIAL RESOURCES ON CHANGES IN DEPRESSION

We examine how people's different uses of the Internet predict their later scores on a standard measure of depression, and how their existing social resources moderate these effects. In a longitudinal US survey conducted in 2001 and 2002, almost all respondents reported using the Internet for information, and entertainment and escape; these uses of the Internet had no impact on changes in respondents' level of depression. Almost all respondents also used the Internet for communicating with friends and family, and they showed lower depression scores six months later. Only about 20 percent of this sample reported using the Internet to meet new people and talk in online groups. Doing so changed their depression scores depending on their initial levels of social support. Those having high or medium levels of social support showed higher depression scores; those with low levels of social support did not experience these increases in depression. Our results suggest that individual differences in social resources and people's choices of how they use the Internet may account for the different outcomes reported in the literature.