Collaborative Research: The Organizational Production of Earnings Inequalities

SES-1528294马萨诸塞州阿默斯特大学唐纳德·托马斯科维奇-德维SES-1524787达斯汀·阿文特-霍尔特加州大学欧文SES-1524761安德鲁·彭纳佐治亚州摄政大学收入不平等加剧在高收入国家是一个普遍问题。尽管国民收入和财富不平等的总体轨迹显而易见，但人们对导致这些令人不安的趋势的工作场所和机构动态知之甚少。这个项目调查工作场所收入分配的动态，这是整体收入分配的一个主要组成部分。研究人员将利用六个国家近15年来几乎所有私营部门工作场所及其员工的现有管理数据，检查工作场所水平、不平等程度和趋势。这项研究围绕两个核心问题展开：是什么因素导致了工作场所的整体收入不平等？工作场所如何加剧或减轻教育水平、性别或移民身份等个人差异的影响？独特的比较人口水平的数据设计使研究小组能够在跨国家和次国家的时间背景下解决这两个问题，询问：不平等的产生机制如何作为机构背景的函数而变化？关于不平等的政策辩论主要集中在国家层面的政府再分配上，往往忽视了收入分配因工作场所薪酬变化而变得更加不平等。这项研究将工作场所纳入了对国家不平等程度和发展轨迹的分析。目前的政策讨论往往忽视国家机构和工作场所做法在鼓励或阻碍不平等结果方面的作用。在关系不平等理论的基础上，该项目审查了产生组织收入水平和分配的一般社会机制，以及它们受到体制背景的调节程度。该研究将关联雇主-雇员小组(LEEP)数据与当地机构知识相结合，分析了拥有高质量LEEP数据的六个国家的几乎所有与私营部门所有雇主相关的雇员的数据：德国、法国、瑞典、挪威、斯洛文尼亚和捷克共和国，从大约2000年到现在。这项研究有助于揭示通过教育投资、平等机会执行、工资下限和上限以及其他影响组织不平等差异的机构干预措施的潜力。更好地理解和记录为什么一些公司产生的不平等比其他公司少，这将为不平等是一个自然发生的过程这一观点提供强有力的反叙事。探索国家内部和国家之间的组织差异将揭示符合当代产品和劳动力市场限制的不平等制度的范围。此外，通过将性别和族裔/公民身份不平等与工作场所不平等动态的结构联系起来，研究结果可能揭示增加历史上被边缘化群体的社会包容性的新途径。

SES-1528294 Donald Tomaskovic-Devey University of Massachusetts Amherst SES-1524787 Dustin Avent-Holt University of California-Irvine SES-1524761 Andrew Penner Georgia Regents University Rising income inequality is a widespread problem in high income countries. While the broad trajectories of national income and wealth inequalities are apparent, little is known about the workplace and institutional dynamics that produce these disturbing trends. This project investigates the dynamics of workplace earnings distributions, a major component of the overall income distribution. The researchers will take advantage of available administrative data on nearly all private sector workplaces and their employees for six countries over fifteen years to examine workplace level inequality levels and trends. The research centers on two central questions: What factors drive overall income inequality in workplaces? How do workplaces exacerbate or mitigate the impact of individual distinctions, such as education level, gender or immigrant status? The unique comparative population level data design allows the research team to address these two questions in both cross- and sub-national temporal contexts, asking: How do inequality generating mechanisms vary as a function of institutional context? Policy debates about inequality primarily focus on government redistribution at the national level, often ignoring that income distributions have become more unequal because of workplace compensation shifts. The study brings workplaces into the center of the analysis of national inequality levels and trajectories. Current policy discussions often ignore the role of national institutions and workplace practices in encouraging or discouraging inequality outcomes. Building on Relational Inequality Theory the project examines the generic social mechanisms that produce both levels and distributions of organizational incomes and the degree to which they are moderated by institutional context. Combining Linked Employer-Employee Panel (LEEP) data with local institutional knowledge the research analyses data on virtually all employees linked to all employers in the private sector for six countries with high quality LEEP data: Germany, France, Sweden, Norway, Slovenia and the Czech Republic, from circa 2000 to the present. This study helps uncover the potential for interventions via educational investments, equal opportunity enforcement, wage floors and ceilings, and other institutional interventions that influence organizational variation in inequalities. Better understanding and documenting why some firms produce less inequality than others will provide a powerful counter-narrative to the idea that inequality is a naturally occurring process. Exploring organizational variation within and between countries will reveal the range of inequality regimes compatible with contemporary product and labor market constraints. Further, by linking gender and ethnic/citizenship inequalities to the structure of workplace inequality dynamics study results may reveal new paths for increasing social inclusion of historically marginalized groups.