It’s where you work: increases in earnings dispersion across establishments and individuals in the US

Erling Barth, Alex Bryson, James Davis and Richard Freeman

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: This paper links data on establishments and individuals to analyze the role of establishments in the increase in inequality that has become a central topic in economic analysis and policy debate. It decomposes changes in the variance of ln earnings among individuals into the part due to changes in earnings among establishments and the part due to changes in earnings within-establishments and finds that much of the 1970s-2010s increase in earnings inequality results from increased dispersion of the earnings among the establishments where individuals work. It also shows that the divergence of establishment earnings occurred within and across industries and was associated with increased variance of revenues per worker. Our results direct attention to the fundamental role of establishment-level pay setting and economic adjustments in earnings inequality.

Keywords: Earnings; earnings inequality; productivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D3 J3 J31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 38 pages
Date: 2014-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab and nep-ltv
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (28)

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/60604/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases in Earnings Dispersion across Establishments and Individuals in the U.S (2015)
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases In Earnings Dispersion Across Establishments And Individuals In The U.S (2014)
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases in Earnings Dispersion across Establishments and Individuals in the US (2014)
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases in Earnings Dispersion across Establishments and Individuals in the U.S (2014)
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases in Earnings Dispersion across Establishments and Individuals in the U.S (2014)
Working Paper: It's Where You Work: Increases in Earnings Dispersion across Establishments and Individuals in the U.S (2014)
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