Collaborative Research: Human Capital and Income Inequality

合作研究：人力资本与收入不平等

• 批准号: 0003520
• 负责人: Andrea Moro
• 金额: $ 2万
• 依托单位: University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2000
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2000-07-15 至 2001-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0003520&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Human; Capital; Income

In this research project we are interested in exploring the extent ex post inequalities between nations can arise when countries are ex ante identical. We study a model where imperfectly observable human capital investments are introduced in an otherwise standard neoclassical trade framework. Due to interaction between an informational externality and general equilibrium price effects, inequalities may arise in equilibrium when countries specialize in industries with different intensities in human capital. Citizens in the country specializing as a low human capital country are worse off than citizens in the country specializing as a high human capital country. Because incentives to invest are lower in the low human capital country the situation is self-enforcing. Incentives are bad in the poor country two reasons: 1) with few investors someone who "looks good" is more likely an individual with low human capital that got a "lucky draw"; 2) the possibility to import goods intensive in human capital from the other country makes human capital less valuable compared to a situation where countries don't trade. In our research we will explore how these effects interact and the extent the model provides a rationale for specialization as well as provide a number of testable implications of the model.

在这个研究项目中，我们感兴趣的是探索当国家事先相同时，国家之间的事后不平等会在多大程度上产生。我们研究了一个模型，其中在标准的新古典贸易框架中引入了不完全可观察的人力资本投资。由于信息外部性和一般均衡价格效应之间的相互作用，当各国专门从事人力资本强度不同的行业时，均衡中可能会出现不平等现象。低人力资本国家的公民比高人力资本国家的公民境况更差。由于低人力资本国家的投资动机较低，这种情况是自我实施的。贫穷国家的激励机制不好有两个原因：1)在投资者很少的情况下，“看起来不错”的人更有可能是一个人力资本较低的人，只是“走运”了；2)与不进行贸易的情况相比，从其他国家进口人力资本密集型商品的可能性使人力资本的价值降低。在我们的研究中，我们将探讨这些影响是如何相互作用的，以及该模型为专业化提供的基本原理的程度，以及该模型的一些可测试的含义。