The impact of minimum wages in Mexico and Colombia

There are diverging views about how minimum wages affect labor markets in developing countries. Advocates of minimum wages hold that they redistribute resources in a welfare-enhancing way, and can thus reduce poverty, improve productivity, and foster growth. Opponents, on the other hand, contend that minimum wage interventions result in a misallocation of labor and lead to depressed wages in the very sectors - the rural and informal urban sectors - where most of the poor are found, with the effect of wasting resources and reducing the growth rate. Data from Colombia and Mexico for the 1980s provide an opportunity to evaluate the impact of minimum wages. In Mexico in the 1980s, the minimum wage fell in real terms roughly 45 percent. By 1990, Mexico's minimum wage was about 13 percent of the average unskilled manufacturing wage. During the same period, the minimum wage in Colombia increased at nearly the same rate, reaching roughly 53 percent of the average unskilled wage. The author charts how the mandated minimum wage affected the demand for skilled and unskilled labor in both countries during that decade. Findings are as follows. In Mexico, minimum wages have had virtually no effect on wages or employment in the formal sector. The main reason: the minimum wage is not an effective wage for most firms or workers. In the informal sector, in turn, there is considerable noncompliance with the mandated minimum wage, especially among part-time and female workers. As a result, significant numbers of workers are paid at or below minimum wages. In Colombia, minimum wages have a much stronger impact on wages, judging from their proximity to the average wage and both cross-section and time series estimates. The estimates imply that the elasticity of low-paid unskilled employment with respect to minimum wages is in the range of 2 to 12 percent.Wages, Compensation&Benefits,Environmental Economics&Policies,Labor Policies,Banks&Banking Reform,Municipal Financial Management,Environmental Economics&Policies,Wages, Compensation&Benefits,Child Labor,Banks&Banking Reform,Municipal Financial Management

Why Do Americans and Germans Work Different Hours?

This paper documents the difference between the annual hours worked by employed Americans and Germans, decomposes the difference into differences due to vacation and holiday time and to hours worked while on the job, and examines alternative explanations for the difference. Employed Americans work roughly 10-15% more hours than Germans. Since American employment-population rates exceed those of Germans, adult Americans average some 20% more work time than adult Germans. At the same time, Americans show greater preference for additional hours worked than do Germans. Both of these differences developed in the past 20 years. Two decades ago, Americans worked less than Germans, and it was the Germans who wanted to work more hours. Standard labor supply analyses do not appear able to explain this difference. We show that differences in hours worked are related to differences in earnings inequality across countries, and hypothesize that the high rewards to success in the U.S., lack of job security, and low social safety net compared to Germany or other European countries may explain the cross-country differences in an extended supply model.

Engaging Teens: Using an Engagement Event as a Research Tool for Teenagers

This paper describes the use of an engagement event as a research tool to be utilized when working with teenagers in participatory design process

Transportation and Taxes: What New Hampshire Residents Think About Maintaining Highways and Bridges

In this brief, authors Linda Fogg, Lawrence Hamilton, and Erin Bell share New Hampshire residents’ responses to questions on the state’s transportation infrastructure in surveys conducted by the University of New Hampshire’s Granite State Poll during 2016 and 2017. They report that only 36 percent of state residents are aware of the worsening conditions of New Hampshire highways and bridges. A thin majority support increased spending on public transportation, while 42 percent support more spending on highway maintenance and environmental protection. Disaster preparation and stormwater management are seen as lower priorities. There is little agreement on the main source of funds—for example, tolls, gas taxes, per-mile assessments—to maintain highways and bridges. Majorities would support a gas tax increase of 10 cents or somewhat more if needed to maintain state highways and bridges. Both awareness of infrastructure conditions and willingness to support tax increases to maintain highways and bridges vary by party affiliation

Does a Flexible Industry Wage Structure Increase Employment?: The U.S. Experience

This paper examines the flexibility of wages across industries inthe U.S. and seeks to determine the potential impact which changes in the industrial wage structure may have for employment. With regard to the flexibility of wages across industries, we find that the U.S., alone among the major OECD countries, has experienced substantial changes in the industry wage structure since 1970, with the variation of log wages among industries increasing dramatically, particularly in the 1970s. This represents a widening of the gap between wages in the high and low wage sectors. In order to evaluate these changes, we estimate equations linking changes in industry wages over an extended period of time to a variety of potential wage determining characteristics. We find that industrial wages are positively correlated with value productivity per worker, even after controlling for institutional and supply side factors which may have contributed to the increased dispersion of wages in the 1970s. Our results are not consistent with the standard competitive model of industry labor markets, in which wages and productivity are uncorrelated across sectors and wages depend on aggregate, rather than sectoral conditions.With regard to the impact of a flexible industry wage structure on employment, we evaluate the circumstances under which flexible wages among industries may be employment enhancing, and the set of circumstances under which flexible wages are likely to be employment reducing. For the U.S.economy in the 1970s we find that the data support the latter set of circumstances. The bottom line of the U.S. experience is that flexible wages by industry have not contributed to employment growth.

Play in a Sartrean Feminist Ethics

- none

The Exhaustion Doctrine: State Prisoners Caught between Civil Rights Actions and Writs of Habeas Corpus

This Comment explores the conflict between two federal laws when prisoners challenging their confinement seek damages or declaratory relief. On one hand, the exhaustion doctrine requires state prisoners to exhaust their state remedies before filing a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court when they contest their confinement. On the other hand, prisoners challenging their civil rights may file in federal court without exhausting all state remedies. This Comment addresses how federal courts should determine which rule to apply when a prisoner brings an action contesting confinement, but seeks only declaratory relief or damages. The author proposes a resolution by the use of a two-pronged test that first focuses on what the prisoner is challenging, then, in some cases, upon the remedy the prisoner is seeking

Accuracy of Retrospective Reports of Family Environment

Retrospective reports of family environments are often the only way to collect data concerning the influence of a child's experience in the family on later development. However, the accuracy of retrospective measures can be problematic because of social desirability or potential failures of memory. The purpose of this study is to compare retrospective and prospective measures of family environment. In this unique study, 198 parents and 241 adolescent children (mean age 15.7) described their family environment, and then 25 years later completed retrospective reports. We test the effects of memory, positivity, gender, and generation on retrospective reports, as well as testing the ability of prospective and retrospective measures to predict adult well-being and adult-child/elder-parent relationships. Results show moderate correlations of .30 - .45 between prospective and retrospective measures. In examining the relative effectiveness of prospective and retrospective measures to predict later life outcomes, we find that retrospective reports of the family environment most validly capture influences on the child in domains of strong emotional content but are less successful in cognitive domains