Search Results

Author: Morris, Martina
Resulting in 12 citations.
1. Bernhardt, Annette
Morris, Martina
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Divergent Paths: Economic Mobility in the New American Labor Market
New York, NY: Russell Sage, 2001
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Keyword(s): Earnings; Job Promotion; Job Turnover; Mobility; Mobility, Economic; Mobility, Job; Mobility, Labor Market

Tracks the fortunes of two generations of young white men over the course of their careers to examine the prospects of upward mobility for workers in America's labor market. Two cohorts were drawn from the National Longitudinal Survey of Young Men & the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth respectively. Members of the first sample were initially interviewed in 1966 & tracked until 1981, while the second sample was interviewed yearly between 1979-1994. The older men entered the labor market at a time of prosperity & stability, while the second group began working in the early 1980s, a time marked by recession, deregulation, & the weakening of organized labor. An overview of the historical context is followed by a detailed analysis of the longitudinal data. It was shown that the second group faced a labor market that was more volatile & characterized by lower job security, higher penalties for failing to find steady employer, & growing inequalities between well-connected workers who used short-term projects to obtain better-paying positions, & increasing numbers of workers stuck in a series of low-paying, high-turnover jobs. It is concluded that the labor market of the 1960s & 1970s launched more workers up the earnings ladder than today's market. Policy strategies for improving the upward mobility of workers in the US are discussed.
Bibliography Citation
Bernhardt, Annette, Martina Morris, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. Divergent Paths: Economic Mobility in the New American Labor Market. New York, NY: Russell Sage, 2001.
2. Bernhardt, Annette
Morris, Martina
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Inequality and Mobility: Trends in Wage Growth for Young Adults
Working Paper 99-03, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, July 1999.
Also: http://www.pop.psu.edu/info-core/library/wp_lists/psu.html#1999
Cohort(s): Young Men
Publisher: Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University
Keyword(s): Educational Returns; Intergenerational Patterns/Transmission; Mobility; Modeling, Mixed Effects; Occupational Investment; Variables, Independent - Covariate; Wage Differentials; Wage Growth; Wages, Youth

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

After two decades of rising wage inequality, it is important to examine the impact of these changes on lifetime wage growth. This paper compares the intragenerational mobility of two NLS cohorts of young white men: the first entered the labor market in the late 1960s, the second in the early 1980s. For each cohort, we analyze wage profiles across 16 years using a mixed-effects model. We find that long-term wage growth has both stagnated and become more unequal in recent years. Changes in the composition of and returns to education, experience, occupation and other covariates explain about half the rise in inequality, leaving a significant residual. Our findings suggest a decline in the economic welfare of workers who entered the labor market in the 1980s.
Bibliography Citation
Bernhardt, Annette, Martina Morris, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "Inequality and Mobility: Trends in Wage Growth for Young Adults." Working Paper 99-03, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, July 1999.
3. Bernhardt, Annette
Morris, Martina
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Trends in Job Instability and Wages for Young Adult Men
Journal of Labor Economics 17,4 (October 1999): S65-S90.
Also: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2660667
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Keyword(s): Attrition; Job Status; Mobility, Job; Wage Growth; Wages; Wages, Young Men

Data and measurement problems have complicated the debate over trends in job instability in the United States. We compare two cohorts of young white men from the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS), construct a rigorous measure of job change, and confirm earlier findings of a significant increase in job instability. We then benchmark the NLS against other main data sets in the field and conduct a thorough attrition analysis. Extending the analysis to wages, we find that the wage returns to job changing have both declined and become more unequal for young adults, mirroring trends in their long-term wage growth.
Bibliography Citation
Bernhardt, Annette, Martina Morris, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "Trends in Job Instability and Wages for Young Adult Men." Journal of Labor Economics 17,4 (October 1999): S65-S90.
4. Bernhardt, Annette
Morris, Martina
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Trends in Job Instability and Wages for Young Adult Men
In: On the Job: Is Long Term Employment a Thing of the Past? D. Neumark, ed. New York, NY: Russel Sage Foundation, 2000
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Keyword(s): Attrition; Job Status; Mobility; Wage Growth; Wages; Wages, Young Men

Data and measurement problems have complicated the debate over trends in job instability in the United States. We compare two cohorts of young white men from the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS), construct a rigorous measure of job change, and confirm earlier findings of a significant increase in job instability. We then benchmark the NLS against other main data sets in the field and conduct a thorough attrition analysis. Extending the analysis to wages, we find that the wage returns to job changing have both declined and become more unequal for young adults, mirroring trends in their long-term wage growth.
Bibliography Citation
Bernhardt, Annette, Martina Morris, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "Trends in Job Instability and Wages for Young Adult Men " In: On the Job: Is Long Term Employment a Thing of the Past? D. Neumark, ed. New York, NY: Russel Sage Foundation, 2000
5. Bernhardt, Annette
Morris, Martina
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc M.
Work and Opportunity in the Post-Industrial Labor Market
Final report to the Russell Sage and Rockefeller Foundations. Institute on Education and the Economy, Columbia University, New York NY, 1997.
Also: http://www.tc.columbia.edu/~iee/Labor1.htm
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Keyword(s): Career Patterns; Mobility; Mobility, Job; Mobility, Labor Market; Wage Equations; Wage Gap

One of the most pressing questions facing researchers and policy makers today is how economic restructuring has affected the nature of work and mobility in America. It is no longer simply a matter of rising wage inequality, but increasingly a question of what it means to have a job and to build a career. As workplaces are reorganized, there are potentially strong effects on job stability, career development, and upward mobility. Little is known about the long-term consequences of restructuring, so in this study we compare the first 16 years of work experience for two cohorts of young white men from the National Longitudinal Surveys: the original cohort, followed from 1966-1981, and the recent cohort, followed from 1979-1994. Conclusions and Findings.
Bibliography Citation
Bernhardt, Annette, Martina Morris, Mark S. Handcock and Marc M. Scott. "Work and Opportunity in the Post-Industrial Labor Market." Final report to the Russell Sage and Rockefeller Foundations. Institute on Education and the Economy, Columbia University, New York NY, 1997.
6. Handcock, Mark S.
Morris, Martina
Relative Distribution Methods
Sociological Methodology 28 (1998): 53-97.
Also: http://depts.washington.edu/socmeth2/2abst98.htm
Cohort(s): NLS General
Publisher: American Sociological Association
Keyword(s): Data Analysis; Income Level; Methods/Methodology; Statistics; Variables, Independent - Covariate; Wage Levels

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Presents an outline of relative distribution methods, with an application to recent changes in the US wage distribution, using data from the 1966 & 1979 panels of the National Longitudinal Survey. Relative distribution methods are a nonparametric statistical framework for analyzing data in a fully distributional context. The framework combines the graphical tools of exploratory data analysis with statistical summaries, decomposition, & inference. The relative distribution is similar to a density ratio, & technically defined as the random variable obtained by transforming a variable from a comparison group by the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of that variable for a reference group. This transformation produces a set of observations, the relative data, that represent the rank of the original comparison value in terms of the reference group's CDF. The density & CDF of the relative data can be used to fully represent & analyze distributional differences, allowing analysis to move beyond comparisons of means & variances. The analytic framework is general & flexible, as the relative density is decomposable into the effect of location & shape differences, & into effects that represent both compositional changes in covariates & changes in the covariate-outcome variable relationship. 5 Tables, 6 Figures, 2 Appendixes, 67 References. Adapted from the source document
Bibliography Citation
Handcock, Mark S. and Martina Morris. "Relative Distribution Methods." Sociological Methodology 28 (1998): 53-97.
7. Handcock, Mark S.
Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Comparing Earnings Inequality Using Two Major Surveys
Monthly Labor Review 123,3 (March 2000): 48-61.
Also: http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2000/03/art4full.pdf
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: U.S. Department of Labor
Keyword(s): Current Population Survey (CPS) / CPS-Fertility Supplement; Earnings; Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID)

Some previous research suggests that discrepancies exist between the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and the Current Population Survey in terms of earnings trends; when the sample is limited to full-time, year-round workers, however, the discrepancies are largely eliminated. Much of the research on the growing dispersion of earnings has relied on the March supplement to the Current Population Survey (CPS). As the research questions have turned to such issues as job instability and long-term wage growth, however, the focus often has shifted to longitudinal surveys, such as the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS). In a recent unpublished but widely cited paper, Peter Gottschalk and Robert A. Moffitt compare annual earnings trends from the PSID and two cohorts of the NLS with those of the CPS. The authors find that reported earnings in the PSID and the original NLS cohort show roughly the same trends as the CPS, although the magnitudes are quite different.
Bibliography Citation
Handcock, Mark S., Martina Morris and Annette Bernhardt. "Comparing Earnings Inequality Using Two Major Surveys." Monthly Labor Review 123,3 (March 2000): 48-61.
8. Handcock, Mark S.
Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Discrepancies in Estimates of the Growth in Earnings Inequality in the CPS and NLSY
Presented: New York, NY, Population Association of America Meetings, March 1999
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: Population Association of America
Keyword(s): Current Population Survey (CPS) / CPS-Fertility Supplement; Earnings; Part-Time Work; Underreporting; Wage Differentials

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Recently Gottschalk and Moffitt (1997) analyzed three major longitudinal data sets from 1979-88 to see if the same trends in inequality appeared. They find that the National Longitudinal Survey of Young Men (NLSY) understates the rise in earnings inequality (compared to the CPS), thus raising serious questions about the validity of the NLSY for research on recent trends in inequality. In this paper we update the comparison of the NLSY and CPS to include the 1989-1994 surveys and use additional analyses to locate the sources of, and potential explanations for, the discrepancy between these two data sets. We find that the NLSY-CPS differential appears to be driven by part-time or part-year (PT/PY) workers' earnings. Underreporting by CPS PT/PY workers seems like the simplest explanation for this pattern, as the NLSY survey module on jobs and earnings is much more thorough than the CPS instrument.
Bibliography Citation
Handcock, Mark S., Martina Morris and Annette Bernhardt. "Discrepancies in Estimates of the Growth in Earnings Inequality in the CPS and NLSY." Presented: New York, NY, Population Association of America Meetings, March 1999.
9. Handcock, Mark S.
Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Trends in Earnings Dispersion in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and the Current Population Survey
Working Paper 98-14, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, April 1998.
Also: http://athens.pop.psu.edu/allen/WPapersSer.cfm?series=1998
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University
Keyword(s): Current Population Survey (CPS) / CPS-Fertility Supplement; Earnings; Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID); Wage Differentials; Wages

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

In an unpublished but widely cited paper, Gottschalk and Moffitt (1997) benchmark earnings trends from 1979-88 in three major longitudinal data sets -- the Michigan Panel Study on Income Dynamics (PSID) the National Longitudinal Survey (NLSB) and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) -- against the CPS. They find that the NLSY has both significantly lower variance in reported annual earnings, and a negative trend in variance over time. As this stands in sharp contrast to the primary "stylized fact" of increasing earnings variance during the 80's, the findings raise serious questions about the validity of the NLSY for research on recent trends in inequality. In this paper we update the Gottschalk and Moffitt comparison of the NLSY and CPS through 1994 and use additional analyses to locate the sources of, and potential explanations for, the discrepancy between the two data sets. We find no significant difference in the trend in earnings dispersion among full-time, full-year workers between the two surveys. The discrepancy reported by Gottschalk and Moffitt appears to be due to the lower mean and greater variance in reported earnings among those who work part-time and/or part-year in the CPS. This suggests the problem stems from underreported earnings in the CPS, rather than errors in the NLSY.
Bibliography Citation
Handcock, Mark S., Martina Morris and Annette Bernhardt. "Trends in Earnings Dispersion in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and the Current Population Survey." Working Paper 98-14, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, April 1998.
10. Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
The Transition to Work in the Post-Industrial Labor Market
Working Paper 98-12, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, August 1998
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University
Keyword(s): Education; Employment, Intermittent/Precarious; Mobility, Job; Re-employment; Transition, School to Work; Unemployment; Wage Differentials; Wage Growth; Working Conditions

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Also: Presented: San Francisco, CA, American Sociological Association Meetings, August 1998

American workers have witnessed striking changes in their jobs and wages during the last three decades. It is no longer simply a matter of growing income inequality, but increasingly deeper changes that go to the root of what it means to have a job and to build a career. Young workers are pessimistic about their chances for upward mobility and education no longer seems a guarantee of success. Workplaces are being restructured, creating anxiety about being laid-off and downsized. The recovery of the 1990s did not prove the cure-all that other recoveries have in the past, and disadvantaged groups in particular are being left behind. There is a growing sense that Americans are working under new rules. The very character of the American employment relationship appears to be changing - in how the workplace is organized, in how workers are matched with jobs, and in how wages and the terms of employment are set. This paper reports on a subset of findings from a larger study of the changes in job and wage mobility over the past 30 years. In this study, we compare two cohorts of young white men, from the National Longitudinal Surveys. The original cohort entered the labor market in the late 1960s at the tail of the economic boom, and was followed through the 70s decade. The recent cohort entered the labor market in the early 1980s after the onset of economic restructuring, and was followed through the early 90s. We observe both cohorts for a full 16 years, at exactly the same ages - respondents are in their late teens and early 20s at the start of the survey, and are in their mid-30s by the end. We can therefore compare the progress of the two cohorts during the initial stages of their careers, but under different economic conditions. It is during this period that workers make the transition from school to work, and lay the groundwork for an eventual long-term relationship wi th an employer. The key finding reported in this paper is that the transition to the labor market has become longer and more volatile. Young workers who do not go on to college are more likely to be intermittently unemployed and to rely on part-time jobs for a greater number of years. This is especially marked among high school dropouts. Those who do go on to college are more likely to work while enrolled and to significantly draw out the period of enrollment. For both groups, it takes longer to find a full-year job than it has in the past. The recent cohort is also less likely to make a single, clean transition to the labor market. Instead, these young workers are more likely to move back and forth between work, unemployment, enrollment, and non-participation. Workers at all levels of education have experienced this greater volatility, but it has been most pronounced among those with less education. There is noticeably more shifting between industries in the recent cohort, at all ages. Some of this is driven by deindustrialization and the shift to service industries, but not all of it. The greater volatility on these dimensions has taken its toll on the work experience that young workers accumulate. Average work experience is similar across the two cohorts. But there is considerably more variability in the amount of work experience that the recent cohort has accumulated, and this holds true across all education groups. Findings from the larger study indicate that this contributes to greater inequality in wages and wage growth for this cohort, trends that are likely to persist over their life course.

Bibliography Citation
Morris, Martina, Annette Bernhardt, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "The Transition to Work in the Post-Industrial Labor Market." Working Paper 98-12, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, August 1998.
11. Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Wage Inequality and Labor Market Segmentation: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study Cohorts
Presented: Chicago, IL, Population Association of America Meetings, April 1998
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Population Association of America
Keyword(s): Labor Market Segmentation; Mobility; Mobility, Economic; Mobility, Job; Wage Equations; Wage Growth

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

The long term implications of the recent dramatic growth in economic inequality are not well understood. A key question is whether growing cross-sectional inequality is being driven by rising labor market segmentation into winners and losers: some workers with jobs that provide high wages and economic mobility, but others caught in a cycle of dead-end jobs with little opportunity for lifetime wage growth. We analyze the early work histories of two cohorts of young white men from the NLS for evidence of such changes. Both cohorts are 14-22 at entry and are followed for 16 years. The original cohort entered in 1966, the recent in 1979. We find that job instability has risen in the recent cohort, and that their longitudinal age-earnings profiles are becoming more unequal. The evidence suggests that labor market segmentation is rising, and that members of the recent cohort face a lifetime of greater inequality.
Bibliography Citation
Morris, Martina, Annette Bernhardt, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "Wage Inequality and Labor Market Segmentation: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study Cohorts." Presented: Chicago, IL, Population Association of America Meetings, April 1998.
12. Morris, Martina
Bernhardt, Annette
Handcock, Mark S.
Scott, Marc A.
Wage Inequality and Labor Market Segmentation: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study Cohorts
Working Paper 98-07, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, April 1998.
Also: ftp://ftp.pop.psu.edu/papers/psu-pri/wp9807.pdf
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men
Publisher: Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University
Keyword(s): Education; Job Training; Job Turnover; Labor Market Segmentation; Marriage; Unions; Wage Growth

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

In this paper, we take up the question of whether there has been a secular rise in job instability among young workers over the past three decades. We compare two NLS cohorts of young white men - the first cohort entering the labor market in the late 60s and throughout the 70s, and the second during the 80s and early 90s. Using longitudinal data on work history and schooling, we find a significant increase in the rate of job changing across the two cohorts. Some of the increase is explained by the trend toward lower marriage rates and longer transitions into the labor market. The economy's shift toward the service sector has also played an important role, although declines in stability have occurred in traditionally unionized industries as well. Together, these factors explain about one-half of the cohort difference. The overall rise in instability has resulted in shorter median tenures. While greater job instability and shorter tenures are not necessarily a bad thing - job changing can be beneficial to wage growth early in the career - we find that young workers in recent years have failed to capture the all-important wage gains that were associated with job changing in the past. This deterioration in wage gains has been felt largely by less educated workers, but inequality in these gains has also increased, for all education groups. In combination, our findings suggest declines in the long-term economic welfare of recent entrants into the labor market.
Bibliography Citation
Morris, Martina, Annette Bernhardt, Mark S. Handcock and Marc A. Scott. "Wage Inequality and Labor Market Segmentation: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study Cohorts." Working Paper 98-07, Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, April 1998.