We develop a simple search equilibrium model of workplace training and education based on two features. First, investment in education improves job-related learning skills and reduces training costs burdened by firms. Second, firms with vacant skilled job slots can choose between recruitment...

Due to pension reforms, minimum retirement age increased substantially in Italy between the second part of the 1990s and the early 2000s. We compare the training participation of pre- and post-reform cohorts of private sector employees and estimate that adding one year to minimum retirement age...

We use data on international chess tournaments to study the relationship between age and mental productivity in a brain-intensive profession. We show that less talented players tend to leave the game in the earliest phases of their career. When the effects of age on productivity vary with...

The reduction of early school leaving to less than 10 percent of the relevant population by 2020 is a headline target in the Europe 2020 strategy and one of the five benchmarks of the strategic framework for European cooperation in education and training. Designing adequate policies to combat...

We investigate the role of local social pressure in shaping the geographical pattern of firms' firing decisions. Using French linked employer-employee data, we show that social pressure exerted by the local communities where firms' headquarters are located induces CEOs to refrain from dismissing...

We use a natural experiment to show that the presence of an external examiner in standardized school tests reduces the proportion of correct answers in monitored classes by 5.5 to 8.5% – depending on the grade and the test – with respect to classes in schools with no external monitor. We...

While it is well known that birth order affects educational attainment, less is known about its effects on earnings. Using data from eleven European countries for males born between 1935 and 1956, we show that firstborns enjoy on average a 13.7 percent premium over laterborns in their wage at...

We study the transitions from career to bridge jobs and to permanent retirement by European males aged 55 to 70 at the time of the interview in the late 2000s. We find that only 10.54 percent of the workers in our sample who were in a career job at age 50 have moved to a bridge job by the time...

We ask whether local agglomeration affects how recessions impact on entrepreneurship by comparing the probability of being an entrepreneur before and after the Great 2008 Recession in local labour markets where industrial districts are present and in comparable areas. Using Italian Labour Force...

The "Retired Husband Syndrome", that affects the mental health of wives of retired men around the world, has been anecdotally documented but never formally investigated. We use Japanese micro data and the exogenous variation generated by the 2006 revision of the Japanese Elderly Employment...