Knowledge that Transforms

Using microdata for 22 countries over the 198594 period, we find that more compressed male wage structures and lower female net supply are both associated with a lower gender pay gap, with an especially large effect for wage structures. Reduced-form specifications indicate that the extent of collective bargaining coverage is also significantly negatively related to the gender pay gap. Together, the wage compression and collective bargaining results suggest that the high wage floors that are associated with highly centralized, unionized wage setting raise women's relative pay, since women are at the bottom of the wage distribution in each country.

Using 1998 data, we show that the gender log wage gap in Sweden increases throughout the wage distribution and accelerates in the upper tail. We interpret this as a strong glass ceiling effect. We use quantile regression decompositions to examine whether this pattern can be ascribed primarily to gender differences in labor market characteristics or in the rewards to those characteristics. Even after extensive controls for gender differences in age, education (both level and field), sector, industry, and occupation, we find that the glass ceiling effect we see in the raw data persists to a considerable extent.

This article proposes a formal model of migration in which workers are heterogeneous and markets are stochastically correlated. We derive and characterize the optimal migration pattern of a family. We show that migration can take place even when migrants earn less abroad and, surprisingly, when earnings in the foreign country are riskier for every member of the family. Moreover, it may well be an optimal arrangement to have only dependents migrate, thus rationalizing the recent dependent-oriented migration flows from places like Hong Kong and Taiwan. We provide some evidence in support of our theory.

Over the past 3 decades, the U.S. Temporary Help Services (THS) industry grew five times more rapidly than overall employment. Contemporaneously, courts in 46 states adopted exceptions to the common law doctrine of employment at will that limited employers' discretion to terminate workers and opened them to litigation. This article assesses the contribution of "unjust dismissal" doctrine to THS employment specifically, and outsourcing more generally, finding that it is substantialexplaining 20% of the growth of THS between 1973 and 1995 and contributing 500,000 additional outsourced workers in 2000. States with smaller declines in unionization also saw substantially more THS growth.

The categories listed below are used to classify books, book reviews, journal articles, and dissertations indexed in JEL and EconLit. The list details the full three-digit classifications used to index journal articles in JEL on CD, EconLit, and e-JEL on www.e-JEL.org . The Annotated Listing of New Books printed in this issue uses the bold face one- and two-digit classifications; the Book Reviews in each issue and the Doctoral Dissertations List printed in December appear under the on-digit classification headings. Please note that books, book reviews, and dissertations are indexed in EconLit using the full three-digit classifications. Those who classify papers or dissertations should choose the most appropriate three-digit classifications. New changes to classification system appear as soon as possible on www.AEAweb.org .

The categories listed below are used to classify books, book reviews, journal articles, and dissertations indexed in JEL and EconLit. The list details the full three-digit classifications used to index journal articles in JEL on CD, EconLit, and e-JEL on www.e-JEL.org The Annotated Listing of New Books printed in this issue uses the bold face one- and two-digit classifications; the Book Reviews in each issue and the Doctoral Dissertations List printed in December appear under the on-digit classification headings. Please note that books, book reviews, and dissertations are indexed in EconLit using the full three-digit classifications. Those who classify papers or dissertations should choose the most appropriate three-digit classification. New changes to classification system appear as soon as possible on www.AEAweb.org