Human Capital Investment, Inequality, and Economic Growth

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Murphy, Kevin M.; Topel, Robert H.
• 署名单位: University of Chicago
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF LABOR ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0734-306X
• DOI: 10.1086/683779
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: S99-S127
• 关键词: wage inequality; relative wages; unemployment; income

摘要

We treat rising inequality as an equilibrium outcome in which human capital investment fails to keep pace with rising demand for skills. Investment affects skill supply and prices on three margins: the type of human capital in which to invest, how much to acquire, and the intensity of use. The latter two represent the intensive margins of human capital acquisition and utilization. These choices are substitutes for the creation of new skilled workers, yet they are complementary with each other, magnifying inequality. When skill-biased technical change drives economic growth, greater inequality reduces growth.