Do Informal Referrals Lead to Better Matches? Evidence from a Firm's Employee Referral System

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Brown, Meta; Setren, Elizabeth; Topa, Giorgio
• 署名单位: Federal Reserve System - USA; Federal Reserve Bank - New York; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); IZA Institute Labor Economics
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF LABOR ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0734-306X
• DOI: 10.1086/682338
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: 161-209
• 关键词: labor-market networks; social networks; job; unemployment; youth; turnover; contacts; QUALITY; search; TENURE

摘要

Using a new firm-level data set that includes explicit information on referrals by current employees, we investigate the hiring process and the relationships among referrals, match quality, wage trajectories, and turnover for a single US corporation and test various predictions of theoretical models of labor market referrals. We find that referred candidates are more likely to be hired; experience an initial wage advantage, which dissipates over time; and have longer tenure in the firm. Further, the variances of the referred and nonreferred wage distributions converge over time. The observed referral effects appear to be stronger at lower skill levels. The data also permit analysis of the role of referrer-referee pair characteristics.