Social scientists are often interested in assessing relative changes between two groups over time, for example, the convergence of black-white wages from 1940 to 1990. In such situations, we need a control group for both treatment groups to remove biases resulting from time trends and unobserved...

We present a detailed decomposition method and provide a Stata estimator to assess relative changes between two groups over time in a synthetic cohort analysis. Using the convergence of black–white wage gap between 1960 and 1970 as an example, we show that education accounts for 73% of the...

Since China promulgated new minimum wage regulations in 2004, the magnitude and frequency of changes in the minimum wage have been substantial, both over time and across jurisdictions. This paper uses county-level minimum wage panel data and a longitudinal household survey from 16 representative...

This paper presents evidence that since 1980, relative to other immigrants, the earnings of Taiwanese immigrants have grown rapidly as they assimilate into the U.S. economy. Our estimates indicate that the rising returns to education, pre-migration experience and hours worked per week play...

This paper links finance theory to labor economics in the context of migration and immigration policy. Using event analysis, I measure the impact of immigration policy on the firm profits, in particular the American Competitiveness and Workforce Improvement Act (ACWIA) of 1998 nearly doubled the...

Using 1990, 2000 censuses and a 2010 survey, I examine the economic performance of ethnically Chinese immigrants from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan (CHT) in the U.S. labor market. Since 1990, relative wages of CHT migrants have been escalating in contrast to other immigrants. I show these...

This paper presents a method helpful in analyzing the sources of return in an event study. A generalized decomposition result derived from the differential between two random linear functions attributes the effect of events or regulations on the value of firms to differences in economy-wide and...