IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/4213.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Are Rising Wage Profiles a Forced-Saving Mechanism?

Author

Listed:
  • David Neumark

Abstract

This paper tests the hypothesis that rising earnings profiles are a mechanism by which individuals engage in forced saving. It does this by examining the cross-sectional relationship between overwithholding on income tax payments--behavior that is consistent with a preference for forced saving--and the slopes of age-earnings profiles. The force-saving hypothesis receives some support from earnings regression estimates. Individuals who receive tax refunds are on earnings profiles that are steeper and have lower intercepts, although the evidence is statistically significant in only a subset of the specifications estimated. On average, individuals who receive refunds have about one percentage point faster earnings growth per year.

Suggested Citation

  • David Neumark, 1992. "Are Rising Wage Profiles a Forced-Saving Mechanism?," NBER Working Papers 4213, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:4213
    Note: LS
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w4213.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Linda A. Bell & David Neumark, 1991. "Lump-Sums, Profit Sharing, and the Labor Costs in the Union Sector," NBER Working Papers 3630, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. George Loewenstein & Richard H Thaler, 2003. "Anomalies: Intertemporal Choice," Levine's Working Paper Archive 618897000000000784, David K. Levine.
    3. Jacob A. Mincer, 1974. "Schooling, Experience, and Earnings," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number minc74-1.
    4. Thaler, Richard H & Shefrin, H M, 1981. "An Economic Theory of Self-Control," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(2), pages 392-406, April.
    5. James L. Medoff & Katharine G. Abraham, 1980. "Experience, Performance, and Earnings," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 95(4), pages 703-736.
    6. Sherwin Rosen & Paul Taubman, 1982. "Changes in Life-Cycle Earnings: What Do Social Security Data Show?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 17(3), pages 321-338.
    7. Lorne Carmichael, 1983. "Firm-Specific Human Capital and Promotion Ladders," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 14(1), pages 251-258, Spring.
    8. Jacob A. Mincer, 1974. "Schooling and Earnings," NBER Chapters, in: Schooling, Experience, and Earnings, pages 41-63, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Joanne Salop & Steven C. Salop, 1976. "Self-selection and turnover in the labor market," Special Studies Papers 80, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    10. Loewenstein, George F & Sicherman, Nachum, 1991. "Do Workers Prefer Increasing Wage Profiles?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(1), pages 67-84, January.
    11. Loewenstein, George & Thaler, Richard H, 1989. "Intertemporal Choice," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 181-193, Fall.
    12. Milton Harris & Bengt Holmstrom, 1982. "A Theory of Wage Dynamics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 49(3), pages 315-333.
    13. 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.
    14. Milton Harris & Bengt Holmstrom, 1981. "A Theory of Wage Dynamics," Discussion Papers 488, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    15. Joanne Salop & Steven Salop, 1976. "Self-Selection and Turnover in the Labor Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 90(4), pages 619-627.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gokhale, Jagadeesh & Groshen, Erica L & Neumark, David, 1995. "Do Hostile Takeovers Reduce Extramarginal Wage Payments?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 77(3), pages 470-485, August.
    2. Louise Sheiner, 1999. "Health care costs, wages, and aging," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1999-19, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Alberto Bayo-Moriones & Jose E. Galdon-Sanchez & Maia Güell, 2010. "Is seniority-based pay used as a motivational device? Evidence from plant-level data," Research in Labor Economics, in: Jobs, Training, and Worker Well-being, pages 155-187, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    3. Alberto Bayo-Moriones, 2001. "Seniority-based pay: is it used as a motivation device?," Working Papers 0103, Departament Empresa, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, revised May 2001.
    4. Benoit Dostie, 2011. "Wages, Productivity and Aging," De Economist, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 139-158, June.
    5. Dohmen, Thomas J., 2004. "Performance, seniority, and wages: formal salary systems and individual earnings profiles," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(6), pages 741-763, December.
    6. John G. Sessions & Nikolaos Theodoropoulos, 2014. "Tenure, Wage Profiles and Monitoring," Research in Labor Economics, in: New Analyses of Worker Well-Being, volume 38, pages 105-162, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    7. Michael Waldman, 1990. "A Signalling Explanation for Seniority Based Promotions and Other Labor Market Puzzles," UCLA Economics Working Papers 599, UCLA Department of Economics.
    8. Christian Grund & Dirk Sliwka, 2007. "Reference-Dependent Preferences and the Impact of Wage Increases on Job Satisfaction: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 163(2), pages 313-335, June.
    9. repec:eee:labchp:v:1:y:1986:i:c:p:305-355 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. John Haltiwanger & Michael Waldman, 1984. "Insurance Aspects of Labor Market Contracting: An Overview," UCLA Economics Working Papers 348, UCLA Department of Economics.
    11. Emmanuel Saez & Manos Matsaganis & Panos Tsakloglou, 2012. "Earnings Determination and Taxes: Evidence From a Cohort-Based Payroll Tax Reform in Greece," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(1), pages 493-533.
    12. Michael Waldman, 2012. "Theory and Evidence in Internal LaborMarkets [The Handbook of Organizational Economics]," Introductory Chapters,, Princeton University Press.
    13. Hellerstein, Judith K & Neumark, David & Troske, Kenneth R, 1999. "Wages, Productivity, and Worker Characteristics: Evidence from Plant-Level Production Functions and Wage Equations," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(3), pages 409-446, July.
    14. Grund, Christian & Sliwka, Dirk, 2003. ""The Further We Stretch the Higher the Sky" - On the Impact of Wage Increases on Job Satisfaction," Bonn Econ Discussion Papers 1/2003, University of Bonn, Bonn Graduate School of Economics (BGSE).
    15. Rupert, Peter & Zanella, Giulio, 2015. "Revisiting wage, earnings, and hours profiles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 114-130.
    16. Michael Waldman, 1984. "Job Assignments, Signalling, and Efficiency," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(2), pages 255-267, Summer.
    17. Haltiwanger, John & Waldman, Michael, 1986. "Insurance and Labor Market Contracting: An Analysis of the Capital Market Assumption," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 4(3), pages 355-375, July.
    18. John Haltiwanger & Michael Waldman, 1983. "Why Bad Wokers Receive Raises," UCLA Economics Working Papers 301, UCLA Department of Economics.
    19. Smith, John, 2009. "Cognitive dissonance and the overtaking anomaly: Psychology in the principal-agent relationship," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(4), pages 684-690, August.
    20. David N. Margolis, 1996. "Cohort Effects and Returns to Seniority in France," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 41-42, pages 443-464.
    21. Baptista, Rui & Lima, Francisco & Preto, Miguel Torres, 2012. "How former business owners fare in the labor market? Job assignment and earnings," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 263-276.
    22. Goldin, Claudia D., 1984. "The historical evolution of female earnings functions and occupations," Scholarly Articles 30703975, Harvard University Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:4213. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.