Overeducation, Job Competition and Unemployment

Joan Muysken and Bas ter Weel

No 30, Research Memorandum from Maastricht University, Maastricht Economic Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT)

Abstract: The changing wage and employment structure in some OECD countries has beenattributed to increased levels of education and technical change in favour of skilledworkers. However, in the Netherlands and some other OECD countries the wages ofskilled workers did not rise, whereas investment in skills rose dramatically. This paperoffers a theory which is able to explain the dramatic increase in the level of education andskills without rising wages since the early 1980s. In this respect, we integrate the supplyside framework (human capital investments) and the demand side (containingendogenous skill upgrading as a result of job competition and screening) in a generalequilibrium model. In this way we provide a theory for the empirical observation ofrising unemployment levels among unskilled workers and rising employment levels ofskilled workers with relatively stable wages.

Keywords: economics of technology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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