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The schooling response to a sustained increase in low-skill wages: evidence from Spain 1989-2009

Author

Listed:
  • Aitor Lacuesta

    (Banco de España)

  • Sergio Puente

    (Banco de España)

  • Ernesto Villanueva

    (Banco de España)

Abstract
The response of human capital accumulation to changes in the anticipated returns to schooling determines the type of skills supplied to the labor market, the productivity of future cohorts, and the evolution of inequality. Unlike the US, the UK or Germany, Spain has experienced since 1995 a drop in the returns to medium and tertiary education and, with a lag, a drop in schooling attainment of recent cohorts, providing the opportunity to estimate the response of different forms of human capital acquisition to relative increases in low-skill wages. We measure the expected returns to schooling using skill-specific wages bargained in collective agreements at the province-industry level. We argue that those wages are easily observable by youths and relatively insensitive to shifts in the supply of workers. Our preferred estimates suggest that a 10% increase in the ratio of wages of unskilled workers to the wages of mid-skill workers increases the fraction of males completing at most compulsory schooling by between 2 and 5 percentage points. The response is driven by males from less educated parents and comes at the expense of students from the academic high school track rather than the vocational training track.

Suggested Citation

  • Aitor Lacuesta & Sergio Puente & Ernesto Villanueva, 2011. "The schooling response to a sustained increase in low-skill wages: evidence from Spain 1989-2009," Working Papers 1208, Banco de España.
    • Handle: RePEc:bde:wpaper:1208
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stéphane Bonhomme & Laura Hospido, 2017. "The Cycle of Earnings Inequality: Evidence from Spanish Social Security Data," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 127(603), pages 1244-1278, August.
    2. Luis Diéz-Catalán & Ernesto Villanueva, 2015. "Contract staggering and unemployment during the great recession: evidence from Spain," Working Papers 1431, Banco de España.
    3. Jose Maria Casado, 2012. "Consumption partial insurance of Spanish households," Working Papers 1214, Banco de España.
    4. Florentino Felgueroso & Maria Gutiérrez-Domènech & Sergi Jiménez-Martín, 2014. "Dropout trends and educational reforms: the role of the LOGSE in Spain," IZA Journal of Labor Policy, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 3(1), pages 1-24, December.
    5. Ignacio García Pérez, J. & Osuna, Victoria, 2014. "Dual labour markets and the tenure distribution: Reducing severance pay or introducing a single contract," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 1-13.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Collective bargaining; human capital;

    JEL classification:

    • J52 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Dispute Resolution: Strikes, Arbitration, and Mediation
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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