Essays on Firm Dynamics and Inequality

Essays on Firm Dynamics and Inequality PDF Author: Ou Liu
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Languages : en
Pages : 0

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In chapter 2, I study what do changes in top sales shares signal about changes in large firm dynamics. I use an accounting decomposition to identify two sources of top sales shares growth: (i) incumbent top firms grow bigger; (ii) new top firms replace old top firms. I then build a continuous-time random growth model to infer the growth dynamics of firms at the upper tail of firm size distribution. In Chapter 3, in collaboration with Tam Mai, Istudy the implications of occupational and regional inequality on the labor market after the breakout of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Essays on Firm Dynamics and Inequality

Essays on Firm Dynamics and Inequality PDF Author: Ou Liu
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In chapter 2, I study what do changes in top sales shares signal about changes in large firm dynamics. I use an accounting decomposition to identify two sources of top sales shares growth: (i) incumbent top firms grow bigger; (ii) new top firms replace old top firms. I then build a continuous-time random growth model to infer the growth dynamics of firms at the upper tail of firm size distribution. In Chapter 3, in collaboration with Tam Mai, Istudy the implications of occupational and regional inequality on the labor market after the breakout of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Essays in Economic Development, Firm Dynamics and Inequality

Essays in Economic Development, Firm Dynamics and Inequality PDF Author: Faisal Sohail
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ISBN:
Category : Electronic dissertations
Languages : en
Pages : 117

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This dissertation studied detailed micro-level evidence to understand macroeconomic outcomes over time and across economies. The three chapters that comprise this dissertation study the following: 1) the role of employer size in the entry, size and growth of firms, 2) the interaction of income inequality and entrepreneurial entry, and 3) the effects of financial market liberalization on income inequality. Identifying the determinants of firm entry, size and growth is important for understanding aggregate outcomes within and across economies. The first chapter, "Employer Size and Spinout Dynamics" contributes to this understanding by studying the role of employer size on the formation and success of spinouts i.e. firms founded by former employees of existing firms. Using individual and firm level data from Mexico, I document a negative (positive) relationship between spinout entry (growth) and employer size. In other words, smaller firms are more likely to generate spinouts than larger firms and these spinouts grow slower than those from larger firms. Although a qualitatively similar relationship is observed in data from the U.S., there are large quantitative differences in the levels of spinout formation. To understand the impact of these differences on aggregate outcomes, I build an empirically consistent model of occupational choice and firm dynamics in which workers can learn from and adopt the productivity of their employers to form spinouts. In this framework, differences in the rate of spinout formation between U.S. and Mexico are driven by differences in the efficiency with which employees learn from their employers. I interpret this efficiency as capturing a form of managerial quality. Calibrating the model to match spinout entry across the two countries accounts for a significant share of the observed differences in output per worker, entrepreneurship and firm growth. These findings highlight the relevance of spinouts for aggregate outcomes, as well as the potential for management practices to not only impact incumbent firms but also future entrants. In the second chapter of this dissertation, "Skill Biased Entrepreneurial Decline", my co-author and I study the forces behind the decline of firm startups in the U.S. since the late 70's. We document that this decline in entry into entrepreneurship is more pronounced for skilled individuals and posit that it is due, in part, to the changing income structures of workers and entrepreneurs. We show this to be the case by introducing a rising worker skill premium in a model of occupational choice. Our findings emphasize the importance of rising income inequality in understanding the skill biased decline in entrepreneurship and the broader decline in business dynamism in the U.S. In the third chapter, "Financial Market Liberalization and Inequality", my co-authors and I investigate the role of bank branching deregulation on inequality at the top and bottom end of the income distribution in the U.S. By exploiting differences in the timing of deregulation across states , we establish a causal link between financial market liberalization and the increase (decrease) of top (bottom) income inequality. We argue that deregulation impacts inequality through direct effects on earnings in the financial sector, as well as indirect spill overs from this sector to the rest of the economy. Empirical evidence supporting these direct and indirect channels is provided. These findings contribute to understanding current trends and predicting future trends in inequality.

Essays on Collective Bargaining, Wage Inequality and Firm Dynamics

Essays on Collective Bargaining, Wage Inequality and Firm Dynamics PDF Author: Juraj Briškár
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Essays in Firm Dynamics, Ownership and Aggregate Effects

Essays in Firm Dynamics, Ownership and Aggregate Effects PDF Author: Henri Luomaranta
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Administrative registers maintained by statistical offices on vastly heterogeneous firms have much untapped potential to reveal details on sources of productivity of firms and economies alike. It has been proposed that firm-level shocks can go a long way in explaining aggregate fluctuations. Based on novel monthly frequency data, idiosyncratic shocks are able to explain a sizable share of the Finnish economic fluctuations, providing support to the granular hypothesis. The global financial crisis of 2007-2008 has challenged the field of economic forecasting, and nowcasting has become an active field. This thesis shows that the information content of firm-level sales and truck traffic can be used for nowcasting GDP figures, by using a specific mixture of machine learning algorithms. The agency problem lies at the heart of much of economic theory. Based on a unique dataset linking owners, CEOs and firms, and exploiting plausibly exogenous variations in the separation of ownership and control, agency costs seem to be an important determinant of firm productivity. Furthermore, the effect appear strongest in medium-sized firms. Enterprise group structures might have important implications on the voluminous literature on firm size, as large share of SME employment can be attributed to affiliates of large business groups. Within firm variation suggests that enterprise group affiliation has heterogeneous impacts depending on size, having strong positive impact on productivity of small firms, and negative impact on their growth. In terms of aggregate job creation, it is found that the independent small firms have contributed the most. The results in this thesis underline the benefits of paying attention to samples encompassing the total population of firms. Researchers should continue to explore the potential of rich administrative data sources at statistical offices and strive to strengthen the ties with data producers.

Essays on Firm Dynamics, Financial Frictions, and the Labor Market

Essays on Firm Dynamics, Financial Frictions, and the Labor Market PDF Author: Dongchen Zhao
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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This dissertation consists of three chapters. The first chapter concerns the secular changes in the U.S. firm size distribution and firm dynamics. This chapter sets up a quantitative model of firm dynamics with debt heterogeneity to study the implications of changes in real interest rates for the firm size distribution and firm dynamics. It shows that the decline in long-term real interest rates since the early 1980s can account for a significant fraction of the shift in employment shares to large firms as well as the decline in firms per capita and firm entry rates experienced in the U.S. over the same period. In the model, firms endogenously choose financial intermediaries issuing debt with either earnings-based (EBC) or asset-based (ABC) borrowing constraints. The two types of constraints arise naturally from the imperfect enforceability of debt contracts and are in line with recent empirical findings. A decline in real interest rates benefits firms with EBC more because they are not constrained by their assets and can expand more due to increased earnings. Since firms with higher earnings optimally choose earnings-based lending, the decline in real interest rates shifts employment shares to larger firms. Moreover, the growth of large firms crowds out smaller firms and firm entry through general equilibrium effects. The paper tests the mechanism in cross-country data from the OECD and finds a stronger association between the decline in real interest rates and changes in firm dynamics, especially in countries with deeper credit markets. In the second chapter, I study the effects of government regulations on firm dynamism. The impact of government regulations on the economy is a central topic in policy debates. However, due to the endogeneity of regulations and challenges in measuring them, these debates remain contentious. This paper establishes the causal effects of government regulations on firm dynamism by employing a novel shift-share (Bartik) instrument in conjunction with the RegData dataset, which quantifies regulations based on the text of federal regulatory documents. The primary assumption for identification is that, for each sector, the exposure to regulations from different government agencies at the beginning of the period is exogenous to any confounding factors. The findings reveal that government regulatory restrictions significantly increase firm exit rates and discourage the formation of establishments, while having no substantial impact on firm entry. Furthermore, these restrictions contribute to reduced job creation, elevated job destruction, and diminished overall employment. These effects are consistently observed across various age groups. The results lend support to the idea that government regulations can raise production costs for firms and/or enhance the monopolistic power of certain companies. Both mechanisms can diminish the profits of affected firms, leading to increased firm exit rates and reduced labor demand. Additionally, the findings refute the interpretation of regulations as solely serving as entry barriers. The final chapter of the dissertation investigates the labor market outcomes for involuntary part-time workers and their subsequent effects on welfare levels. Through an analysis of survey data, I demonstrate that involuntary part-time workers exhibit reservation wages comparable to those of unemployed workers. This similarity largely stems from parallel wage offers and offer arrival rates. Contrary to previous research, this finding indicates that involuntary part-time workers experience welfare levels akin to unemployed workers. One possible explanation for this discrepancy lies in the methodology of prior studies. Conclusions drawn from earlier research, which primarily focused on the faster transition of involuntary part-time workers into full-time positions compared to other workers, may be flawed. This is because these workers also tend to revert to their previous job types at a faster rate. To further explore the implications of these discoveries, I employ a quantitative search model. The calibrated model supports the assertion that involuntary part-time workers experience welfare levels similar to those of unemployed workers. Furthermore, the model suggests that neither extending unemployment insurance to part-time workers nor enhancing the likelihood that unemployed workers transition to part-time positions would effectively increase the prevalence of full-time employment

Essays on Firm Dynamics, Competition and Productivity

Essays on Firm Dynamics, Competition and Productivity PDF Author: Umut Kılınç
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ISBN: 9789036102506
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 152

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Essays on Firms, Aggregate Uncertainty, and the Labor Market

Essays on Firms, Aggregate Uncertainty, and the Labor Market PDF Author: Nicolò Dalvit
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Languages : en
Pages : 0

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This thesis is comprised of three chapters that revolve around two main themes:the micro economic incidence of macro shocks and the role of firms in determining labor market outcomes. In the first chapter I provide new evidence on the cyclical dynamics of firms. I show that firms expecting to lose market share in the futureare hit the hardest during economic downturns. This heterogeneous sensitivity provides a new rationale for the observed counter-cyclical dispersion in firms'growth rates and has implications for the dynamics of aggregate employment. The second chapter studies the role of income tax progressivity in reallocating income risk across heterogeneous workers and stabilizing the economy. We show that eliminating income tax progressivity in Italy would come at the expense of the majority of the work force. The current system of marginal tax rates is effective atreallocating cyclical income risk from low to high wage workers and reducesaggregate employment volatility compared to a counter-factual flat rate system.The third chapter considers the internal hierarchical structure of a firm and its rolein determining wages and internal promotions. We focus in particular on the rolethat internal hierarchies play in propagating gender differences in representation and pay. We study the effect of a change in the gender composition at the top afirm's internal hierarchy on workers further down the organizational ladder and findsome evidence of an effect only on layers close to the top.

Essays on the Macroeconomic Effects of Inequality

Essays on the Macroeconomic Effects of Inequality PDF Author: Guzmán González-Torres Fernández
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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This dissertation explores the aggregate allocational effects of different forms of economic inequality. Its three chapters study how an uneven distribution of production factors and financial resources, coupled with different forms of bureaucratic hurdles to the development of business ideas, financial constraints, or credit shocks, can affect the distribution and productivity of firms, the composition of the demand for goods and services, or the creation of valuable worker-firm matches in an economy. Even though it becomes clear throughout the dissertation that eliminating as many frictions in the firm-creation process, putting in place different redistribution policies, and alleviating financial frictions in an economy all have great effects on the aggregate economy that were not completely understood in previous theories, the welfare effects of such policies remain a subject for study in future work.

Essays in Firm Dynamics

Essays in Firm Dynamics PDF Author: Lan Dinh
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ISBN:
Category : Competition
Languages : en
Pages : 91

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Essays on Inequality in Labor Markets and Wealth

Essays on Inequality in Labor Markets and Wealth PDF Author: David Nathaniel Wasser
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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This dissertation consists of three essays that address important questions within the fields of labor economics and public economics. I use advanced empirical methods and a combination of restricted access and public-use data to study the role of inequality in labor markets and wealth.In Chapter 1, I study whether the effects of unemployment insurance (UI) extensions are different for workers exposed to higher levels of local labor market concentration, a potential source of employer market power. UI extensions can improve the bargaining power of job seekers relative to employers by improving workers' outside options. I exploit measurement error in state unemployment rates that led to quasi-random assignment of UI durations in the U.S. during the Great Recession. Using matched employer-employee data from the Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics program, I find that UI extensions lengthen nonemployment durations by one week and cause economically meaningful but not statistically significant increases in earnings. The UI-earnings effect is significantly lower at higher levels of concentration, while there is no difference in the UI-duration effect. The lower UI-earnings effect is driven by differences at the extremes of the distribution of concentration. Workers exposed to higher concentration also are slightly more likely to change workplaces, local labor markets, and industries following an extension, but they are not induced to match into less-concentrated markets. My results imply that the benefits of more generous UI, in terms of match quality, are attenuated at higher levels of concentration, and so UI policy that accounts for local concentration is potentially warranted.In Chapter 2, joint with Anne M. Burton, we revisit how Ban the Box (BTB) policies affect the employment of minority men. BTB policies are intended to help ex-offenders find employment by delaying when employers can ask about criminal records. Existing evidence finds BTB causes discrimination against young, non-college-educated minority men. We show that effects for this group are not robust to a simple change in specification and the coding of BTB laws. Using a distinct treatment definition, we find no evidence of statistical discrimination: employment effects are near zero, precisely estimated, and not statistically significant.In Chapter 3, joint with N. Meltem Daysal and Michael F. Lovenheim, we study the effect of changes in parental wealth in childhood on the intergenerational transmission of wealth. Rising wealth inequality has spurred an increased interest in understanding how and why wealth is correlated across generations. Prior research has found an intergenerational correlation between 0.2 and 0.4 and has emphasized the role of family characteristics in driving this correlation. We contribute to this literature by examining the intergenerational transmission of wealth changes, which allows us to isolate the causal effect of wealth shocks from pre-determined parental preferences and household characteristics. Using Danish Register Data, we examine the effect of home price changes that occur between ages 0-5, 6-11, and 12-17 on overall wealth, housing wealth, and nonhousing wealth of adult children at ages 29-33. For the youngest age group, we find that 16.5% and 22.2% of each Krone of home price change is transmitted to overall wealth and housing wealth in adulthood, respectively. The corresponding transmission rates for the 6-11 age group are 30.8% and 18.5%, with a transmission to non-housing wealth of 12.3%. There is no transmission of home price changes that occur during the teenage years for any wealth outcome. Examining mechanisms, we find that home price increases in the first two age groups lead to modest increases in home ownership, educational attainment, and income. There also is an increase in partner wealth for the younger two groups. Income and education can explain less than a third of the intergenerational transmission we document. We argue that our results largely reflect changes to parental/household behaviors and preferences that are passed down to children and cause them to accumulate more housing wealth in young adulthood.