Young and small firms are typically matched with younger and nonemployed individuals, and they provide these workers with lower earnings compared to other firms. To explore the mechanisms behind these facts, a dynamic model of entrepreneurship is introduced, where individuals can choose not to...

This paper is part of the Global Repository of Income Dynamics (GRID) project cross-country comparison of earnings inequality, volatility, and mobility. Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau's Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) infrastructure files, we produce a uniform set of...

This paper presents an empirical assessment of the endogenous optimum currency area theory. Frankel and Rose (1998) study the endogeneity of a currency union through the lens of international trade flows. Our study extends Frankel and Rose's model by using FDI flows to test the original theory...

Most of the rise in overall earnings inequality is accounted for by rising between-industry dispersion from about ten percent of 4-digit NAICS industries. These thirty industries are in the tails of the earnings distribution, and are clustered especially in high-paying high-tech and low-paying...

Entrepreneurship is essential for a healthy labor market. Recent evidence shows that young businesses (at most ten years old) have, on average, accounted for all of US employment growth over the past few decades. New businesses are especially important for youth employment. However, these...

The share of the U.S. population that receives business income has increased substantially in recent decades. At the same time, worker hire and separation rates declined, with worrying implications for productivity and wage growth. In this paper, we explore the relationship between business...

In recent years, the rate at which workers and businesses exchange jobs has declined in the United States. Between 1998 and 2010, rates of job creation, job destruction, hiring, and separation declined dramatically, and the rate of job-to-job flows fell by about half. Little is known about the...

We document and attempt to explain the recent decline in employment dynamics in the U.S. We have four major empirical findings. First, each measure exhibits a 'stair step' pattern, with the declines concentrated in recessions and little increase during subsequent expansions. Second, changes in...

This paper explores the evolution of the average wage of employees over the life-cycle of a manufacturing plant. The average wage starts out low for a new plant and increases along with labor productivity as the plant ages. As a plant approaches exit, its average wage falls, but more slowly than...

What type of businesses do unions target for organizing? A dynamic model of the union organizing process is constructed to answer this question. A union monitors establishments in an industry to learn about their productivity and decides which ones to organize and when. An establishment becomes...