Displacement and Downsizing Effects on Older Workers

这是一项关于企业裁员对老年员工影响的研究。本研究使用当前人口调查和劳工统计局大规模裁员系列的匹配数据来探索内部劳动力市场、大规模裁员、工人年龄和工作置换概率之间的关系。解释这些关系的具体假设来自社会学的两种不同的制度理论--“符号效率”和“内在二元论”--以及一种微观经济理论--拉齐尔的强制退休理论。这些假设将在个人分析水平上进行评估，允许对不同背景下特定年龄组的流离失所概率进行统计概括。工人失业，尤其是企业裁员导致的失业，已经成为批评和担心美国经济表现的避雷针。尽管以当代标准来看，失业率相对较低，但最近的流离失所人数和类型令人担忧，因为它们被解读为我国就业关系基本结构发生变化的信号。特别是，许多观察人士认为，解雇长期工人是令人信服的证据，表明在一个临时工作的时代，雇主和工人之间持久而稳定的关系已经消失。在认真对待这一结论之前，需要解决像这项研究中审查的那些经验性问题。该项目除了有助于验证有关雇佣关系的不同社会科学命题外，还将为这一社会生活领域的政策分析人员提供重要的背景信息。例如，可以在有或没有其他个人特征(如教育)和行业特征(如行业养老金覆盖率)控制的情况下，检查特定年龄组的流离失所概率。

This is a study of the effects of corporate downsizing on older workers. This research uses matched data from Current Population Surveys and from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Mass Layoff Series to explore the relationships among internal labor markets, mass layoffs, workers' ages, and the probabilities of job displacement. Specific hypotheses that explain these relationships are generated from two different institutional theories from sociology -- "symbolic efficiency" and "internal dualism"-- and from one microeconomic theory -- Lazear's mandatory retirement theory. These hypotheses will be evaluated at the individual level of analysis allowing statistically generalizable statements about age group specific displacement probabilities under different contextual circumstances. Worker displacements, especially those which result from corporate downsizing, have become a lightening rod for criticism and concern about U. S. economic performance. Although unemployment is relatively low by contemporary standards, the number and type of recent displacements are troubling insofar as they have been interpreted as signaling a change in the basic fabric of our country's employment relations. In particular, many observers have taken dismissals of long-term workers as convincing evidence that durable and stable relationships between employers and workers have disappeared in an era of contingent work. Empirical questions like those examined in this study need to be addressed before this conclusion can be taken seriously. In addition to this project's contribution to verifying different social science propositions about employment relationships, it will also provide important background information for policy analysts in this area of social life. For example, it will be possible to examine age-group specific displacement probabilities with and without controls for both other individual characteristics (e.g. education) and for industry level characteristics (e.g. pension coverage in the industry) .