Earnings and Linguistic Proficiency in a Bilingual Economy

Andrew Henley and Rhian Eleri Jones

No 106, Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 from Royal Economic Society

Abstract: Bilingualism is a widespread phenomenon, yet its economic effects are under researched. Typically studies find that bilingual workers are disadvantaged. Governments often protect minority languages through official promotion of bilingualism, with potential economic consequences. This paper addresses the impact of bilingualism on earnings, using the example of Wales. Results show a positive raw differential of 8 to 10 per cent depending on definition of linguistic proficiency. The use of Welsh in the workplace is not directly productive. Nevertheless language choice and earnings appear to be endogenous. The differential can be entirely explained by a selection effect. This is consistent with the effectiveness of legislation to promote the minority language.

Keywords: earnings; language choice; human capital (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J15 J24 J31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003-06-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://repec.org/res2003/Henley.pdf full text

Related works:
Journal Article: EARNINGS AND LINGUISTIC PROFICIENCY IN A BILINGUAL ECONOMY* (2005)
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:ecj:ac2003:106

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 from Royal Economic Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Christopher F. Baum (baum@bc.edu).