Real Wage Convergence in Romania: Empirical Evidence Based on Club Converging

The study aims to explore the real wage convergence across the 42 Romanian counties from 1991 to 2016 by using the convergence algorithm developed by Phillips and Sul (2007). The process of divergence is identified in the period of 1991-2016 as well as a number of 4 convergence subgroups (clusters). Transitional curves indicate that over the long-run the real wage tends to converge. Policy implications of the paper’s findings are also provided.

Internal Labor Markets, Wage Convergence, and Investment

I document wage convergence in conglomerates using detailed plant-level data: Workers in low-wage industries collect higher-than-industry wages when the diversified firm also operates in high-wage industries. I confirm this effect by exploiting the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and changes in minimum wages at the state level as sources of exogenous increases in wages in some plants. I then track the evolution of wages of the remaining workers of the firm, relative to workers of unaffiliated plants. Plants where workers collect higher-than-industry wages operate with higher capital intensity, suggesting that internal labor markets may affect investment decisions in internal capital markets.

WAGE CONVERGENCE ON THE COUNTY-LEVEL IN POLAND: A PANEL DATA APPROACH

This study investigates nominal wage convergence on the county level in Poland from 2005 till 2017, while accounting for the structural heterogenity of the units and common time shocks. Results reveal that wage levels converge to their own steady-state with the speed of 7.6% of the imbalance per year. When time fixed effects are accounted for, this speed becomes higher and has a value of 34.5%. Common time effects, such as economic cycle considerably contribute to the convergence speed. The exclusion of time effects tends to bias downward the estimated convergence rate. With regard to σ-convergence, wage inequalities across the counties decreased over the years 2005–2010 with their levels moving toward the national average. However, as of 2010 this process, if any, is very slow.

The human capital of migrants and the convergence of wages in the regions of Russia

In this paper we present the results of the assessment of the impact of internal migration and human capital of migrants on the convergence of regions on wages. Using Rosstat data for 2002—2016 for 77 Russian Regions we have estimated dynamic GMM model with spatial effects. The results have showed that internal migration increases the speed of convergence regions on wages. The impact of migration on the wage convergence of regions depends on the level of education of migrants.

Occupational Career Change and Gender Wage Inequality

This article examines the relationship between the changing occupational careers of female wage earners and gender wage inequality. Using Current Population Survey-Merged Outgoing Rotation Group data, it assesses the effect on the gender wage gap of changes in the composition and price both of care-providing occupations that are culturally associated with female labor and of managerial and professional occupations that are not part of the care economy, over the period 1979 to 2015. It finds that the rapid entry of female workers into high-wage managerial occupations, and their exit from low-wage private household work, contributed to gender wage convergence. However, the wage-equalizing effects of occupational shifts and related behavioral changes diminish over time, and wage convergence ceases after 2007. It also finds that female workers continue to be disadvantaged by wage dispersion and that most of the remaining gender wage gap arises within occupations. The concluding sections discuss the findings and their implications for closing the wage gap.