Social returns to education in a developing country

This paper estimates social returns to education in Turkey. Most evidence on spillovers from human capital comes mostly from developed countries, and estimates vary from country to country. The paper nds that social returns to education are around 3-4%, whereas private returns per year of education amount to 5% in Turkey. Moreover, the findings indicate that workers with lower skills, or working in sectors with lower average wages benet most from externalities. The results are robust to a series of checks, using a number of individual and regional controls, as well as instrumental variable estimation

Education-occupation mismatch in Turkish labor market

There is a consensus that one of the most important ingredients for high and sustainable growth is human capital accumulation. Yet, a dierent strand of literature argues that there are some frictions in the labor markets of most countries that result in possible education-occupation mismatches, and consequently inefficiencies. Despite a significant amount of research using data from advanced economies there are very few studies on developing economies. Considering that human capital is scarce in these countries, whether it is efficiently allocated is arguably relatively more important. This paper using data from two different years examines the incidence of overeducation in Turkey. The ndings show that there is a signicant amount of over- and undereducated workers, and they are paid signicantly less than those with the same level of education but working in jobs that require education levels that match their own. The magnitude of the incidence and the impact of mismatches on wages are, however, not too different than in most developed economies

Education-occupation mismatch in Turkish labor market

There is a consensus that one of the most important ingredients for high and sustainable growth is human capital accumulation. Yet, a different strand of literature argues that there are some frictions in the labor markets of most countries that result in possible education-occupation mismatches, and consequently inefficiencies. Despite a significant amount of research using data from advanced economies there are very few studies on developing economies. Considering that human capital is scarce in these countries, whether it is efficiently allocated is arguably relatively more important. This paper using data from two different years examines the incidence of overeducation in Turkey. The findings show that there is a significant amount of over- and undereducated workers, and they are paid significantly less than those with the same level of education but working in jobs that require education levels that match their own. The magnitude of the incidence and the impact of mismatches on wages are, however, not too different than in most developed economies.human capital, overeducation, returns to schooling, Turkey

Channel switching behavior during the modernization of grocery retailing in Turkey

(a) Purpose: Considering the increasing competition and channel diversity due to retail modernization we aim to study the channel switching behavior progress in a long horizon and the customer-related factors as influencers of channel switching. (b) Design/Methodology/Approach: Major channel switching behaviors of households are analyzed during six years, using household panel data covering grocery purchases from supermarket, local market and traditional channels in Turkey. Household demographics and behavioral variables are induced from dataset and Logistic regression model is employed to measure the effects of customer-related variables on the probability of channel switching. (c) Findings: Traditional channel still keeps the highest loyal customer base in Turkey. Loyalty to both traditional channel and supermarkets decreases, while to local markets increases by time. Households loyal to traditional channel transfer either a small amount of their purchases to modern channels or make modern channels their major channel occasionally. In any case, there is a transition period experienced in Turkish grocery retail market. A multi-channel usage behavior or higher adoption to modern channel might me the result of this transition. (d) Research Limitations/Implications: Channel level analysis limits to define channel-related variables, such as price, place, product-variety specific to each channel format. Excluding these variables might explain partially the low explanatory power of the model. (e) Practical Implications: Analyzing channel-switching behavior, its progression and explaining determinants is important for retailers and producers in predicting the future of market structure, modern retail customer base and in designing the growth strategies. The variables influencing channel switching help to explain some barriers of modern retail development

Exchange rates and employment in Turkish manufacturing

This paper investigates the effects of exchange rate fluctuations on Turkish manufacturing employment and wages using data for a panel of manufacturing industries over the period 1981-1999. The net effect of depreciations are found to be negative for both employment and wages, though the effects on wages are more pronounced. The negative effect of high dependency of Turkish manufacturing industries on foreign inputs overcomes the positive effect of depreciations on competitiveness.exchange rates, labor market, manufacturing, Turkey

Social returns to education in a developing country

This paper estimates social returns to education in Turkey. Most evidence on spillovers from human capital comes mostly from developed countries, and estimates vary from country to country. The paper finds that social returns to education are around 3-4%, whereas private returns per year of education amount to 5% in Turkey. Moreover, the findings indicate that workers with lower skills, or working in sectors with lower average wages benefit most from externalities. The results are robust to a series of checks, using a number of individual and regional controls, as well as instrumental variable estimation.human capital externalities, returns to education, wages

Capacity Choice, Foreign Trade and Exchange Rates

We investigate the effects of exchange rate movements on investment decisions of firms in an oligopolistic market. In a two-country-world model, we focus on the capacity investment decisions of small (small initial capacity and high marginal cost) and large (large initial capacity and low marginal cost) domestic firms. Both type of firms use foreign inputs in production and sell their output in the foreign market, thus they are prone to changes in exchange rate from both cost and demand side. Results show that devaluations alter the composition of production and the relative share of small and inefficient firms at the expense of large and efficient firms in the economy. The investment response to exchange rates is more pronounced in more competitive markets.Capacity investment, exchange rates, market structure.

Türkiye'de suç ve emek piyasası ilişkisi

İktisat yazınında suç üzerine yapılan uygulamalı çalışmalar, suç işlemenin, suçun beklenen getirisi ile maliyeti arasındaki farka dayalı olduğu savının sınanması üzerinedir. Kimi araştırmalarda daha çok suçu engelleyici unsurların, yakalanma ve ceza oranlarının, önemi sınanırken, diğer çalışmalarda suç oranları ile emek piyasası arasında ilişki araştırılmıştır. Bu çalışma, daha çok iktisadî olarak gelişmiş ülkeleri temel alan araştırmalardaki sonuçların Türkiye örneğinde ne kadar geçerli olduğunu incelemektedir. Türkiye’deki veriler sadece yasal suça dair olması nedeni ile suçu engelleyici unsurların test edilmesi mümkün değildir. Buna karşılık, Türkiye İstatistik Kurumu tarafından sağlanan, 1990-2008 yılları arasını kapsayan, bölgesel düzeyde ve suç türlerine göre ayrımı bulunan veriler ile önce suç oranlarının zaman içerisinde evrimi incelenmekte, daha sonra hanehalkı işgücü anketlerinden ve bölgelerarası farklardan yararlanarak, suçun diğer belirleyicilerinin saptanması ve bunların göreli önemi tartışılmaktadır. Özellikle de, emek piyasasındaki gelişmelerin, ücret ve işsizliğin suç oranları üzerine etkisi araştırılmaktadır. Sonuçlar yazında daha önceki bulgulara paralel olarak ücretlerin suçu azalttığını, işsizliğin ise önemli bir etkisinin olmadığını göstermektedir

The determinants of internal migration in Turkey

Internal migration has had a great impact on Turkey’s population dynamics for decades. According to the 2000 population census, nearly 28% percent of the population was born in a different province that they now reside in. This ratio goes up to 62% for Istanbul, a major province that has drawn migrants for years. Although, it is claimed in numerous studies that rural-urban migration that centers on a few urban areas seems to be the predominant pattern of internal migration, we aim to investigate further to see if new patterns of internal migration have emerged. The immense socioeconomic differences between regions shape inter-regional migration. The dynamics of migration differ across regions as each region has its unique geographical and socioeconomic structure. However, previous studies suggest that despite these differences, there are common economic and social factors that affect internal migration. Gender differences also have an important role in determining internal migration patterns, which is apparent when we consider the differences in reasons for migration between different genders. Although education levels have increased significantly for females over the last decade, marriage and dependent mi¬gration still overwhelm other relevant factors such as job seeking. This shows that one needs to distinguish between different genders when analyzing internal-migration. Thus, this paper presents an empirical study on the determinants of internal migration in Turkey. Using data from the 1990 and 2000 population censuses, we present a descriptive analysis and estimate an extended gravity model of migration. We show that both economic factors such as income differentials and unemployment rates, and social factors such as presence of social networks have a significant impact on migration. Moreover, following in part the approach of family migration models, we examine the effect of uncertainty on migration in our model

Nonlinear impact of inflation on relative price variability

Using a half-a-century long disaggregated price data for 22 food products collected from 19 cities, we show that the association between inflation and price variability is nonlinear with respect to changes in inflation rate. We obtain similar results for expected and unexpected inflation