We test the hypothesis that IT workers accept a compensating differential to work with emerging IT systems, and that employers that invest in these systems can, in turn, capture greater value from the wages they pay. We show that much of the utility IT workers derive from these systems is from...

Concerns that there are problems with the supply of skills, especially education-related skills, in the US labor force have exploded in recent years with a series of reports from employer-associated organizations but also from independent and even government sources making similar claims. These...

The extensive literature on knowledge management spans several fields, but there are remarkably few studies that address the basic question as to whether knowledge management practices improve organizational performance. I examine that question using a national probability sample of...

Employers routinely provide financial support for their employees who pursue post-secondary education despite the fact that it represents perhaps the classic example of a general skill' that costs the employer money and raises the market wages of employees who possess it. The analysis below...

The interest in examining job security and job stability has been driven in part by the phenomenon of downsizing. The distinctiveness of downsizing, as opposed to more traditional layoffs, is that the job cuts do not necessarily appear to be driven by shortfalls in demand but instead appear to...

The analyses below compare the career histories and personal characteristics of the executives in the top ranks of the world's largest and most stable business operations, the Fortune 100, between 1980 and 2001. To our knowledge, there have been no prior studies of contemporary changes in the...

Students receiving financial aid pay different amounts for equivalent education and do so in different ways: Grants, which do not have to be repaid, loans, which are paid back in the future, and work-study, pay-as-you-go. We examine the effects of need-based aid independent of study ability on...

This paper investigates employee performance appraisals using data from a single US firm between 2001 and 2007. We find that performance appraisals are both informative and drive important components of the employment contract. We find that employee appraisal scores vary considerably both...

We examine an aspect of job search in the important context of executive-level jobs using a unique data set from a prominent executive search firm. Specifically, we observe whether or not executives pursue offers to be considered for a position at other companies. The fact that the initial call...

The notion of regular, full-time employment as one of the defining features of the U.S. economy has been called into question in recent years by the apparent growth of alternative or "nonstandard" arrangements - part-time work, temporary help, independent contracting, and other arrangements....