Occupational Matching and Cities

Theodore Papageorgiou

No 1011, Boston College Working Papers in Economics from Boston College Department of Economics

Abstract: In this paper, I document that workers in larger cities have significantly more occupational options than workers in smaller ones. They are able to form better occupational matches and earn higher wages. I also note differences in the occupational reallocation patterns across cities. I develop a dynamic model of occupational choice that microfounds agglomeration economies and captures the empirical patterns. The calibration of the model suggests that better occupational match quality accounts for approximately 35% of the observed wage premium and a third of the greater inequality in larger cities.

Keywords: Occupations; Agglomeration Economies; Urban Wage Premium; Multi-armed Bandits; Geographical Mobility; Matching Theory; Wage Inequality; Job Vacancy Postings (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J24 J31 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020-06-14
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dge, nep-geo, nep-lma, nep-ore and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://fmwww.bc.edu/EC-P/wp1011.pdf main text (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Occupational Matching and Cities (2022)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:boc:bocoec:1011

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Boston College Working Papers in Economics from Boston College Department of Economics Boston College, 140 Commonwealth Avenue, Chestnut Hill MA 02467 USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Christopher F Baum ().