Tenures that Shook the World: Worker Turnover in Russia, Poland and Britain

Hartmut Lehmann () and Jonathan Wadsworth

No 90, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We study worker turnover in a transition economy to investigate to what extent the length of time a worker has been employed by a firm shapes the turnover process. Using data from the Polish Labor Force Survey and The Russian Longitudinal Monitor Survey we compare the pattern of turnover with a Western economy, Britain. We show tenure profiles are higher and flatter in Russia than and steeper and lower in Poland than in Britain. The characteristics of workers hired in the state and private sectors do not look very different. State and private sector firms in Poland offer the same wages to new recruits, but new private sector jobs in Russia appear to offer wage premia relative to new state jobs. We argue that these observations are consistent with a framework where the value of seniority in jobs begun under the old order may be small and the value of a continued job match unsure, offset, in Poland at least, by insider resistance to layoffs.

Keywords: worker turnover; transition economies; Job tenure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J6 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 42 pages
Date: 1999-12
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

Published - published in: Journal of Comparative Economics, 2000, 28 (4), 639-664

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Related works:
Journal Article: Tenures That Shook the World: Worker Turnover in Russia, Poland, and Britain (2000)
Working Paper: Tenures that Shook the World: Worker Turnover in Russia, Poland and Britain (2000)
Working Paper: Tenures that shook the world: worker turnover in Russia, Poland and Britain (2000)
Working Paper: Tenures that Shook the World: Worker Turnover in Russia, Poland and Britain (1999)
Working Paper: Tenures that Shook the World: Worker Turnover in Russia, Poland and Britain (1999)
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