Eric Gould - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Eric Gould

Journal of Labor Economics, Apr 1, 2020

This paper examines the transmission of human capital from parents to children using variation in... more This paper examines the transmission of human capital from parents to children using variation in parental influence due to parental death, divorce, and the increasing specialization of parental roles in larger families. All three sources of variation yield strikingly similar patterns that show that the strong parent-child correlation in human capital is largely causal. In each case, the parent-child correlation in education is stronger with the parent who spends more time with the child and weaker with the parent who spends relatively less time parenting. These findings help us understand why educated parents spend more time with their children.

Social Science Research Network, 2005

This paper uses the mass migration wave to Israel in the 1990s to examine the impact of immigrant... more This paper uses the mass migration wave to Israel in the 1990s to examine the impact of immigrant concentration in elementary school on the long-term academic outcomes of native students in high school. To identify the causal effect of immigrant children on their peers, we exploit random variation in the number of immigrants across grades within the same school. The results suggest that the overall presence of immigrants had essentially no effect on the quality of the high school attended by native Israelis and on dropout rates, and at most a mild negative effect on high school matriculation rates. However, when we break up the sample by parents' education and by ethnic origin, we find that disadvantaged children were more likely to have been adversely affected by a higher immigrant concentration in elementary school. Focusing on the impact of Ethiopian immigrants who are from a much lower socio-economic background, we find stronger evidence of adverse effects, especially for disadvantaged students and in classes where immigrant concentration was particularly high.

The American Economic Review, Feb 1, 2008

This paper examines why developed countries are monogamous while rich men throughout history have... more This paper examines why developed countries are monogamous while rich men throughout history have tended to practice polygyny (multiple wives). Wealth inequality naturally produces multiple wives for rich men in a standard model of the marriage market. This paper argues that the sources of inequality, not just the level of inequality, determine the equilibrium degree of monogamy or polygyny. In particular, when inequality is determined more by disparities in human capital versus non-labor income (such as land, capital, corruption), the outcome is more monogamous. This explains why developed countries, where human capital is the main source of income and inequality, are monogamous while less-developed economies tend to be polygynous. The results are driven by the larger inequality in the value of women in the marriage market in modern economies. When the value of human capital increases, rich men increasingly value quality women who can help them raise quality children more efficiently. As a result, high quality women are valued much more than low quality women, which makes polygyny less affordable for rich men. In this manner, we show that male inequality generates polygyny, but female inequality reduces it. Using data from Cote d'Ivoire, we provide evidence for all the main implications of the model. In particular, we control for a man's total income and show that polygyny increases with non-labor income but decreases with labor income and education. These patterns are strong even within social groups where norms regarding polygyny are likely to be constant.

Individuals choose to invest in general skills through education or technology-speci…c skills by ... more Individuals choose to invest in general skills through education or technology-speci…c skills by working on the job. Technological progress, which occurs randomly across sectors, depreciates technology-speci…c skills -thus increasing the return to education and generating a precautionary element in the demand for education. Consistent with existing empirical evidence, the model predicts that the sources of inequality growth are di¤erent within educated and uneducated workers: increasing randomness is the primary source within uneducated workers, while inequality growth within educated workers is determined more by changes in the composition and return to ability. We demonstrate these predictions empirically, and also provide evidence that workers consider the income risk associated with being an uneducated worker when making their schooling decisions. The model generates an endogenous evolution of inequality "within" and "between" groups that is consistent with the patterns and sources of inequality growth over the last few decades. The model also generates patterns of inequality and skill composition within industrial sectors -most notably, the well-known positive correlation between the rate of technological change and skill-upgrading within an industry.

Economics Letters, 2012

This paper investigates whether the sources of income, not just the levels, determine whether an ... more This paper investigates whether the sources of income, not just the levels, determine whether an individual is monogamous. Our results support the idea that polygyny stunts development by allowing wealthy men to acquire wives rather than investing in child quality.

The Review of Economics and Statistics, Aug 16, 2021

economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our t... more economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our time. Our key objective is to build bridges between academic research, policymakers and society. IZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author.

Our paper in Labour Economics (Gould and Kaplan 2011) examined the general issue of how workers a... more Our paper in Labour Economics (Gould and Kaplan 2011) examined the general issue of how workers affect the productivity of co-workers, and in particular whether unethical practices that boost performance are transmitted between workers. To do this, we investigated the steroid epidemic in Major League Baseball and Jose Canseco's claims that he taught his teammates how to acquire and use steroids and human growth hormone. Our results support Canseco's claim by presenting a striking pattern whereby a player's performance indeed tends to increase after being a teammate of Canseco. Our results are based upon standard measures of performance, and we found very little systematic evidence across outcome measures that any comparable player increased the performance of his peers in a similar way. J. C. Bradbury (2013) has authored an extensive critique of our paper; the present paper is our reply. Bradbury makes no claims that our results are non-replicable or that they involve a ...

This paper examines the rate of emigration from Israel-known as "yerida"in the years 1995 to 2004... more This paper examines the rate of emigration from Israel-known as "yerida"in the years 1995 to 2004. Specifically, we examine how the rate of yerida varies according to education levels, employment status, income, marital status, and the number of years living in Israel. The analysis uses data from the 1995 Israeli census, combined with an indicator for yerida status as of 2004. The data show that the probability of emigrating from Israel is 2.5 times higher for educated individuals (individuals with a bachelor's degree or higher) than those with less education. A similar pattern exists for new immigrants to Israel, although the magnitudes are much larger and the relationship between education and the probability of leaving Israel is much more pronounced.

The Review of Economics and Statistics

This paper examines the impact of manufacturing employment decline on the socio-economic outcomes... more This paper examines the impact of manufacturing employment decline on the socio-economic outcomes within and between black and white Americans since 1960. The analysis shows that manufacturing decline negatively impacted blacks in terms of their wages, employment, marriage rates, house values, poverty rates, death rates, single parenthood, teen motherhood, child poverty, and child mortality. In addition, the decline in manufacturing increased inequality within the black community for wages and other outcomes. Similar patterns are found for whites, but to a lesser degree – leading to larger gaps between whites and blacks in wages, marriage patterns, poverty, single-parenthood, and death rates.

The Economic Journal

Explaining the Unexplained: Residual Wage Inequality, Manufacturing Decline, and Low-Skilled Immi... more Explaining the Unexplained: Residual Wage Inequality, Manufacturing Decline, and Low-Skilled Immigration * This paper investigates whether the increasing "residual wage inequality" trend is related to manufacturing decline and the influx of low-skilled immigrants. There is a vast literature arguing that technological change, international trade, and institutional factors have played a significant role in the inequality trend. However, most of the trend is unexplained by observable factors. This paper attempts to "explain" the growth in the unexplained variance of wages by exploiting variation across locations (states or cities) in the United States in the local level of "residual inequality." The evidence shows that a shrinking manufacturing sector increases inequality. In addition, an influx of low-skilled immigrants increases inequality, but this effect is concentrated in areas with a steeper manufacturing decline. Similar results are found for two alternative measures linked to increasing inequality: the increasing return to education and the decline in the employment rate of non-college men. The overall evidence suggests that the manufacturing and immigration trends have hollowed-out the overall demand for middle-skilled workers in all sectors, while increasing the supply of workers in lower skilled jobs. Both phenomena are producing downward pressure on the relative wages of workers at the low end of the income distribution.

IMF Working Papers, 2016

There is a widespread perception that trust and social capital have declined in United States as ... more There is a widespread perception that trust and social capital have declined in United States as well as other advanced economies, while income inequality has tended to increase. While previous research has noted that measured trust declines as individuals become less similar to one another, this paper examines whether the downward trend in social capital is responding to the increasing gaps in income. The analysis uses data from the American National Election Survey (ANES) for the United States, and the European Social Survey (ESS) for Europe. Our analysis for the United States exploits variation across states and over time (1980-2010), while our analysis of the ESS utilizes variation across European countries and over time (2002-2012). The results provide robust evidence that overall inequality lowers an individual's sense of trust in others in the United States as well as in other advanced economies. These effects mainly stem from residual inequality, which may be more closely associated with the notion of fairness, as well as inequality in the bottom of the distribution. Since trust has been linked to economic growth and development in the existing literature, these findings suggest an important, indirect way through which inequality affects macroeconomic performance.

Cepr Discussion Papers, Dec 1, 2009

Internalizing Agglomeration Economies: The Pricing of Space in Shopping Malls. ... This informati... more Internalizing Agglomeration Economies: The Pricing of Space in Shopping Malls. ... This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Department of Economics, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Connecticut using RePEc data on a server sponsored by the ...

Iza Discussion Papers, Feb 1, 2011

This paper uses variation created by parental deaths in the amount of time children spend with ea... more This paper uses variation created by parental deaths in the amount of time children spend with each parent to examine whether the parent-child correlation in schooling outcomes stems from a causal relationship. Using a large sample of Israeli children who lost one parent during childhood, we find a series of striking patterns which show that the relationship is largely causal. Relative to children who did not lose a parent, the education of the deceased parent is less important in determining child outcomes, while the education of the surviving parent becomes a stronger factor. Moreover, within the group of families that lost a parent, this pattern intensifies when a child loses a parent earlier in life-the education of the deceased parent becomes even less important, while the effect of the surviving parent's schooling intensifies. These results provide strong evidence that there is a causal connection between parent and child schooling, which is dependent on the child's interaction time with each parent. These findings help us understand why educated parents typically spend more time with their children-they are more effective in producing human capital in their children.

This paper demonstrates that mall store contracts are written to internalize externalities throug... more This paper demonstrates that mall store contracts are written to internalize externalities through both an efficient allocation and pricing of space, and an efficient allocation of incentives across stores. Certain stores generate externalities by drawing customers to other stores, whereas many stores primarily benefit from external mall traffic. Therefore, to varying degrees, the success of each store depends upon the presence and effort of other stores, and the effort of the developer to attract customers to the mall. Using a unique data set of mall tenant contracts, we show that rental contracts are written to (i) efficiently price the net externality of each store and (ii) align the incentives to induce optimal effort by the developer and each mall store according to the externality of each store's effort.

The Review of Economics and Statistics, 2002

The labor market prospects of young, unskilled men fell dramatically in the 1980s and improved in... more The labor market prospects of young, unskilled men fell dramatically in the 1980s and improved in the 1990s. Crime rates show a reverse pattern: increasing during the 1980s and falling in the 1990s. Because young, unskilled men commit most crime, this paper seeks to establish a causal relationship between the two trends. Previous work on the relationship between labor markets and crime focused mainly on the relationship between the unemployment rate and crime, and found inconclusive results. In contrast, this paper examines the impact of both wages and unemployment on crime, and uses instrumental variables to establish causality. We conclude that both wages and unemployment are significantly related to crime, but that wages played a larger role in the crime trends over the last few decades. These results are robust to the inclusion of deterrence variables, controls for simultaneity, and controlling for individual and family characteristics.

Ssrn Electronic Journal, 1998

The relationship between crime and labor market conditions is typically studied by looking at the... more The relationship between crime and labor market conditions is typically studied by looking at the unemployment rate. In contrast, this paper argues that wages are a better measure of labor market conditions than the unemployment rate. As the wages of those most likely to commit crime (unskilled men) have been falling in the past few decades, we examine the impact of this trend on the crime rate giving special attention to issues of endogeneity. Wages are found to be a significant determinant of crime and more important than the unemployment rate. As theory would predict, economic factors are more important for property crime than violent crime. These results are robust to various measures of wages, two regression strategies, the inclusion of deterrence variables, and controls for simultaneity.