Collaborative Research on Estimating Equilibrium Search Models

在过去的十年中，大量的努力一直致力于估计劳动力市场模型的求职。这些模型是重要的，因为它们的估算，特别是使用面板数据，可以对政府的各种政策对失业率和工资的影响做出相关的预测。已经采取了几种方法来模拟寻找工作。大多数模型将工作岗位设定在价格接受者的框架内，也就是说，给定了不同工作岗位的工资分配，人们寻找一个至少满足吸引他进入劳动力市场所需的最低工资率的职位。这类模型受到了批评，理由是工资分布在很短的时间内可能不稳定，最近的分析试图通过使用劳动力市场的部分均衡模型来纳入工资分布的变化。这个项目使用了一个局部均衡的框架，在这个框架中，个人在一个生产率因公司而异的市场中进行搜索。工人本身在就业与休闲时间的愿望方面是异质的。工资分配并不是独立于劳动者而稳定的，而是随着劳动者休闲意愿的差异和企业生产率的差异而变化的。该模型是使用全国青年劳动力市场经验纵向调查的数据进行估计的，其中数据跟踪了几组高中毕业生，从他们毕业到他们接受第一份全职工作的时间。这些估计可以用来检验最低工资和失业补偿对失业率的影响，也可以用来检验劳动力市场分割和歧视，并使这些有时定义松散的概念更加严格。该项目是与美国梅隆大学的Zvi Eckstein教授合作完成的。

During the past decade a substantial effort has been devoted to estimating labor market models of job search. These are important models in that their estimation, especially using panel data, can yield relevant predictions about the effects of various government policies on the unemployment rate and on wages. Several approaches have been taken to model the search for work. Most of the models set the job searcher in the framework of a price taker, that is the distributions of wages across jobs is given, and the person searches for a position which meets at least the minimum wage rate required to entice him into the labor force. This type of model has been criticized on the grounds that the wage distribution might not be stable over even very short periods of time, and more recent analyses have tried to incorporate a changing wage distribution by using models of partial equilibrium in the labor market. This project uses a partial equilibrium framework in which individuals search in a market where productivity varies from firm to firm. The workers themselves are heterogeneous with respect to their desires for employment versus leisure time. The wage distribution is not assumed to be stable independent of the workers, but to change in response to differences among workers' desire for leisure and in response to productivity differences among firms. The model is estimated using data from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Labor Market Experience of Youth in which the data follow several cohorts of high school graduates from the time they graduate until the time they accept their first full-time job. The estimates can be used to test the effects of minimum wages and unemployment compensation on the unemployment rate, and also for testing for labor market segmentation and discrimination, and to give these sometimes loosely defined concepts more rigor. This project is done in collaboration with Professor Zvi Eckstein of Carnegie-Mellon University.