A Note on Weak Exogeneity in VAR Cointegrated Models.

In this note an extension of the traditional definition of weak exogeneity when the variables are I(1) and cointegrated is presented. In particular, the concept of long-run weak exogeneity is introduced when the parameters of interest are the elements of the cointegrating vectors. This definition extends some previously available definitions in this framework.

On the properties of the Dickey-Pantula test against fractional alternatives

The limit properties of the testing sequence underlying the Dickey-Pantula test for a double unit root in a time series are derived when the true data generating process is assumed to be nonstationary fractionally integrated.Publicad

Occupational mismatch and moonlighting of Spanish physicians: Do couples matter?

There are important gender differences in the labour-market status of health sciences graduates in Spain: (i) female physicians have lower participation rates than male physicians and, when they work, they are subject to higher occupational mismatch, and (ii) moonlighting is more frequent among male physicians. In this paper we investigate whether such differences are related to the monopsonistic features of the labour market of health-care professionals. Spanish physicians also exhibit another characteristic reducing their geographical mobility in search of a better occupational adjustment: among all university graduates, they are the ones most often coupled to partners with the same educational level and/or same type of studies. Consequently, optimal occupational adjustment of both partners can be a complex process. This stylised fact allows us to provide empirical evidence on a new type of gender discrimination labelled as ?within-couple discrimination?, which arises when geographical mobility of couples is favourable to men, so that they achieve better occupational adjustment than women despite having the same human capital. Finally, we analyse if moonlighting can be interpreted as a way of avoiding monopsonistic effects by increasing the labour supply elasticity.Fundación BBVA / Banco de Santander / La Caix

Asymptotic inference results for multivariate long-memory processes

In this paper, we extend the well-known Sims, Stock and Watson (SSW)(Sims et al. 1990; Econometrica 56, 113?44), analysis on estimation and testing in vector autoregressive process (VARs) with integer unit roots and deterministic components to a more general set-up where non-stationary fractionally integrated (NFI) processes are considered. In particular, we focus on partial VAR models where the conditioning variables are NFI since this is the only finite-lag VAR model compatible with such processes. We show how SSW?s conclusions remain valid. This means that whenever a block of coefficients in the partial VAR can be written as coefficients on zero-mean I(0) regressors in models including a constant term, they will have a joint asymptotic normal distribution. Monte Carlo simulations and an empirical application of our theoretical results are also provided.Publicad

Where do Women Work? : Analysing Patterns in Occupational Segregation by Gender

Our goal in this paper is twofold. First, to examine the role of education and other socio-economic factors in explaining differences between the EU and the US in occupational segregation by gender. And, secondly, to analyse its relationship with job characteristics, remuneration and promotion opportunities of female employees.Publicad

Which Factors Determine Academic Performance of Undergraduate Students in Economics?: Some Spanish Evidence

This paper analyses the determinants of academic performance of first-year undergraduate students in Economics at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, over the period 2001-2005. We focus on a few core subjects which differ in their degree of mathematical complexity. Type of school, specialization track at high school, and the grades obtained at the university entry-exam are among the key factors we examine. Our main finding is that those students who completed a technical track at high school tend to do much better in subjects involving mathematics than those who followed a social sciences track (tailor-made for future economics students) and that the latter do not perform significantly better than the former in subjects with less degree of formalism. Moreover, students from public schools are predominant in the lower and upper parts of the grade distribution while females tend to perform better than males.Banco de Santande

Does immigration affect the Phillips curve? Some evidence for Spain

The Phillips curve has flattened in Spain over 1995?2006: Unemployment has fallen by 15 percentage points, with roughly constant inflation. This change has been much more pronounced than elsewhere. We argue that this stems from the immigration boom in Spain over this period. We show that the New Keynesian Phillips curve is shifted by immigration if natives? and immigrants? labor supply elasticities and bargaining power differ. Estimation of this curve for Spain indicates that the fall in unemployment since 1995 would have led to an annual increase in inflation of 2.5 percentage points if it had not been largely offset by immigration.Publicad

Female Employment and Occupational Changes in the 1990s: How is the EU Performing Relative to the US?

This paper provides a comparison of the incidence and composition of female employment both in the EU and in the US. Despite a significant increase in female labour market participation in the EU, about 50% of the difference between the employment rates in the US and the EU can still be attributed to differences in the educational attainments and the employment rates of women aged 25?54. We highlight the main features of female employment in both areas, paying particular attention to the differences across age cohorts and educational levels. Our main findings are as follows: (i) the educational level of the EU female population is slowly converging to that of the US across age cohorts, (ii) the employment rates of less educated women are much lower in the EU than in the US (with the exceptions of the Scandinavian countries) even for women aged 25?34, and (iii) occupational segregation is lower for the younger highly educated women who seem to be entering more typically male occupations and less typically female occupations, although at a higher rate in the US than in the EU.Publicad