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Why Are Life-Cycle Earnings Profiles Getting Flatter?

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Abstract

The authors present a simple, two-period model of human capital accumulation on the job and through college attainment. They use a calibrated version of the model to explain the observed flattening of the life-cycle earnings profiles of two cohorts of workers. The model accounts for more than 55 percent of the observed flattening for high school-educated and for college-educated workers. Two channels generate the flattening in the model: selection (or higher college attainment) and a higher skill price for the more recent cohort. Absent selection, the model would have accounted for no flattening for high school-educated workers and about 23 percent of the observed flattening for college-educated workers.

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  • B. Ravikumar & Guillaume Vandenbroucke, 2017. "Why Are Life-Cycle Earnings Profiles Getting Flatter?," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 99(3), pages 245-257.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedlrv:00083
    DOI: 10.20955/r.2017.245-257
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Huggett, Mark & Ventura, Gustavo & Yaron, Amir, 2006. "Human capital and earnings distribution dynamics," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 265-290, March.
    2. James Heckman & Lance Lochner & Christopher Taber, 1998. "Explaining Rising Wage Inequality: Explanations With A Dynamic General Equilibrium Model of Labor Earnings With Heterogeneous Agents," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 1(1), pages 1-58, January.
    3. Kong, Y.-C. & Ravikumar, B. & Vandenbroucke, G., 2018. "Explaining cross-cohort differences in life-cycle earnings," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 157-184.
    4. Yoram Ben-Porath, 1967. "The Production of Human Capital and the Life Cycle of Earnings," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75(4), pages 352-352.
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    Cited by:

    1. Benoit Dostie & Genevieve Dufour & Raquel Fonseca & Étienne Lalé, 2020. "Évolution séculaire du profil des salaires en fonction de l’âge : Québec, Canada et États-Unis," CIRANO Project Reports 2020rp-21, CIRANO.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • E20 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)

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