Documents Kampelmann, Stephan 12 results

"We provide first evidence regarding the direct effect of over‐, required, and undereducation on the bottom lines of firms across work environments. We use detailed Belgian linked employer–employee panel data, rely on the methodological approach pioneered by Hellerstein et al. (1999), and estimate dynamic panel data models at the firm level. Our findings show an ‘inverted L' profitability profile: undereducation is associated with lower profits, whereas higher levels of required and overeducation are correlated with positive economic rents of roughly the same magnitude. The size of these effects is amplified in firms experiencing economic uncertainty or operating in high‐tech/knowledge sectors."

"This paper is one of the first to use employer-employee data on wages and labor productivity to measure discrimination against immigrants. We build on an identification strategy proposed by Bartolucci (2014) and address firm fixed effects and endogeneity issues through a diff GMM-IV estimator. Our models also test for gender-based discrimination. Empirical results for Belgium suggest significant wage discrimination against women and (to a lesser extent) against immigrants. We find no evidence for double discrimination against female immigrants. Institutional factors such as firm-level collective bargaining and smaller firm sizes are found to attenuate wage discrimination against foreigners, but not against women."

"This article explores how the diversity of minimum wage systems affects earnings inequalities within European countries. It relies on the combination of harmonized microdata from household surveys, data on national statutory minimum wages and coverage rates and information on minimum rates compiled from more than 1100 sectoral-level agreements across Europe. The analysis covers 18 countries over the period 2007–2009. Empirical results confirm the intuition of many practitioners that the combination of sectoral minima and high collective bargaining coverage can be regarded as a functional equivalent of a binding statutory minimum wage, at least for earnings inequalities. Regression results suggest indeed that both a national statutory minimum and, in countries with sectoral minima, higher collective bargaining coverage is significantly associated with lower levels of (overall and inter-industry) wage inequalities and a smaller fraction of workers paid below prevailing minima. Several robustness checks confirm these findings."

"Minimum wages continue to stir controversial policy debates. This study contributes to a better understanding of minimum wages by providing a solid empirical assessment of minimum wage policies and their socio-economic consequences for a range of European countries. In addition to qualitative differences between minimum wage systems, the report documents international variations in the (absolute and relative) levels of minimum wages. An important contribution of the study is to provide a statistical panorama of the population of minimum wage earners. "

"Various authors have identified a consensus among economists as to how inequality should be quantified, namely by implementing the ‘axiomatic approach to inequality measurement'. However, empirical studies have revealed that this method is often in contradiction with the attitudes of ordinary citizens towards inequality. It is thus a relevant question why the axiomatic approach still commands support in academic applications. This article adopts a historical perspective and presents evidence for our main hypothesis: the axiomatic approach can be interpreted as a result of conventions that allowed specialists to overcome the indeterminacy of the concept ‘inequality'. An unintended consequence of today's measurement conventions appears to be the crowding out of non-scientific representations."

"The authors use matched employer-employee panel data on Belgian private-sector firms to estimate the relationship between wage/productivity differentials and the firm's labor composition in terms of part-time work and gender. Findings suggest that the groups of women and part-timers generate employer rents but also that the origin of these rents differs (relatively lower wages for women, relatively higher productivity for part-timers). Interactions between gender and part-time work suggest that the positive productivity effect is driven by male part-timers working more than 25 hours, whereas the share of female part-timers is associated with wage penalties. The authors conclude that men and women differ with respect to motives for reducing working hours and the types of part-time jobs available to them: women often have to accommodate domestic constraints by downgrading to more flexible jobs, whereas male part-time work is frequently related to training and collectively negotiated reductions in hours that do not affect hourly pay. "

"This paper explores how the diversity of minimum wage systems affects earnings inequalities within European countries. It relies on the combination of (a) harmonized micro-data from household surveys, (b) data on national statutory minimum wages and coverage rates, and (c) hand-collected information on minimum rates from more than 1,100 sectoral-level agreements across Europe. The analysis covers 18 countries over the period 2007-2009. Empirical results confirm the intuition of many practitioners that the combination of sectoral minimum rates and high coverage of collective bargaining can, at least for earnings inequalities, be regarded as a functional equivalent to a binding statutory minimum wage at the national level. Regression results suggest indeed that both a national statutory minimum wage and, in countries with sectoral-level minima, a higher collective bargaining coverage are significantly associated with lower levels of (overall and inter-industry) wage inequalities and a smaller fraction of workers paid below prevailing minima. Several robustness checks confirm these findings."

"Since the mid-2000s, academics, trade unionists and policymakers have been involved in controversial debates about the need for a harmonised European minimum wage policy. This report by three academic experts leaves the beaten track of minimum wage analysis by focussing on the institutional diversity of minimum wage systems within the EU.

The central message of the report is that both the academic and the policymaking community could render the European minimum wage debate more relevant if they framed the current discussion as a choice between alternative systems rather than a choice of any particular rate for Europe as a whole.

The report shows empirically that “the combination of sectoral minimum rates and high levels of collective bargaining coverage can, at least for certain outcomes, be regarded as constituting a functional equivalent to a binding statutory minimum wage at the national level”. But the authors also look at possible trade-offs. Minimum wage systems with statutory rates at national level are related to relatively low wage floors but in systems without statutory minima, there are higher rates for insiders at a cost for outsiders.

All in all, the report demonstrates that the range of policy options related to minimum wages is much larger than the choice of any particular rate."

"This paper aims to provide a comprehensive, evidence-based, and up-to-date assessment of minimum wages in a range of European countries. A first step towards a better understanding of where Europe stands today on this issue requires to grasp the diversity of European minimum wage systems, a key objective of the paper at hand. The second objective is to document international differences in the so-called "bite" of the minimum wage. This leads to questions such as "how do national minimum wages compare to the overall wage distribution?" and "how many people earn minimum wages in each country?" that are assessed for a set of nine countries from Western, Central and Eastern Europe: Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Poland, Romania, Spain, and the United Kingdom. This sample was designed to include countries for which recent evidence has been missing prior to this paper. What is more, the study also overcomes the narrow focus of extant overviews that have typically focussed only on full-time employment. Crucially, the study improves on existing work by looking beyond aggregate numbers; it provides a detailed panorama of the population of minimum wage earners in each country under investigation, notably by describing their composition in terms of a range of socio-demographic characteristics."