This paper documents differences in lifetime earnings risk across occupations due to wage risk, employment risk, and midcareer occupation changes, which can mitigate other shocks. Total lifetime earnings risk varies considerably across starting occupation, and riskier occupations pay more in expectation. The average worker would give up at least 9% of total lifetime earnings in the least certain occupation to reduce the riskiness of that occupation to the level of the safest starting occupation. The insurance value of occupational mobility is quantitatively important. With mobility, workers absorb only 60%, on average, of negative occupation-specific wage shocks.

I develop a model in which individual time discount rates have a larger effect on human capital accumulation when credit constraints are binding. Impatient individuals obtain less schooling when borrowing constraints limit the ability to finance consumption during school. Using data from the NLSY79, I show that self-reported measures of time preferences have a significantly higher effect on the college attendance decisions of blacks than those of whites and the decisions of low-income youths than those of high-income youths. These results provide new evidence that members of disadvantaged groups obtain lower levels of schooling because they are credit constrained.

This article develops a model, with deferred compensation and severance pay, that predicts that workers bear all the costs and receive all the returns of human capital investments and that specific investments yield higher returns than general investments. This model also predicts that pensions, which efficiently defer compensation, will be positively related to specific investments. Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Older Men confirms these predictions; participation in company-sponsored training programs, proxying for specific investments, increases the probability of pension receipt and the level of benefits. More general training outside the firm has much smaller effects on pensions.

This article explores the measurement of labor force dynamics using longitudinal data, focusing in particular on the Canadian Labour Market Activity Survey (LMAS), which represents a potential advance in longitudinal data collection because it measures aspects of dynamics not available in existing panel data such as the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and the National Longitudinal Survey. We examine the implications of the LMAS questionnaire structure-the LMAS filter-for the study of labor market dynamics and undertake simulations to provide a quantitative assessment of the importance of this filter for labor force spells and transitions between labor force states.

Canada has a universal social assistance program that is almost completely administered through the federal Canada Assistance Program. However, provinces determine the levels of assistance for various groups eligible for welfare. This article exploits the variation in payments and uses microdata to estimate the effect of changes in welfare benefits on welfare participation, single parenthood, births out of wedlock, divorce, and labor force participation among low-income women. In Canada, it would appear that welfare benefits influence these decisions.

This study is concerned with the impact of changes in economic conditions on the family. "Three issues are considered in this paper. First, the reasons why the family is not fading away as an economic entity are discussed. The argument of this paper is that, despite the declines in various economic functions of the family and the increases in divorces and in other failures, the survival capacity of the family is both strong and robust." Second, the author contends that the economic approach should be extended to deal with the effects of the life-span revolution, shifts in prices and incomes, and the ability of the family to cope with these changes. Third, the hypothesis is put forward that intergenerational transfers are less important than increases over time in real per capita incomes and changes in income composition, its permanent and temporary components, and the sources of income. The geographical focus is worldwide.

Abstract This study shows that higher banking organization growth is associated with higher operational losses per dollar of total assets and incidence of tail operational losses. Event studies using merger and acquisition activity and instrumental variable regressions provide consistent evidence. The relationship between banking organization growth and operational risk varies by loss event types and balance sheet categories. Higher growth before the Global Financial Crisis predicts higher operational losses during the crisis. We also find evidence that executive compensation incentives and board monitoring could moderate the relationship between growth and operational losses. These findings have implications for banking organization performance, risk management, and supervision as the banking industry continues to grow and consolidate.

Using a unique set of banking data containing both originally-reported and subsequently-revised financial variables, we study accounting restatements. Our results indicate the worse a bank's financial condition, the more likely it is for originally-reported data to understate financial losses. Also, we find supervisory exams have an important role in uncovering financial problems and prompting accounting restatements to correct loss underreporting. While revisions are directly related to financial difficulties, exam-based restatements are evident at even the earliest stages of deterioration, indicating substantial accounting misstatements—at both banks and other types of companies—can occur well outside severe business circumstances.