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Pablo Acosta

World Bank, USA, and IZA, Germany

I hope this research can be useful for policymakers to reconsider efforts toward fostering skills driven by demand, including traditionally overlooked ones such as socio-emotional skills. I recommend IZA WoL for the efforts in disseminating evidence-based synthesized research

IZA World of Labor role

Author

Current position

Senior Economist, The World Bank, The Philippines

Research interest

Labor economics, education, development economics, migration, skills development

Website

http://www.worldbank.org/en/about/people/p/pablo-a-acosta

Positions/functions as a policy advisor

Economist at the World Bank

Past positions

Assistant Instructor of Macroeconomics, University of Illnois at Urbana-Champaign, USA (2004–2005)

Qualifications

PhD Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2006

Selected publications

  • “School attendance, child labour, and remittances from international migration in El Salvador.” Journal of Development Studies 47:6 (2011): 913–936.

  • “Promotion dynamics and the Peter Principle: Incumbents vs. external hires.” Labor Economics 17:6 (2010): 975–986.

  • “What is the impact of international remittances on poverty and inequality in Latin America?” World Development 36:1 (2008): 89–114 (with C. Calderon, P. Fanjzylber, and H. Lopez).

  • "Remittances and the Dutch disease." Journal of International Economics 79:1 (2009): 102–116 (with E. K. K. Lartey and F. S. Mandelman).

  • Minds and Behaviors at Work: Boosting Socioemotional Skills for Latin America’s Workforce. Directions in Development–Human Development. Washington, DC: World Bank, 2016 (with W. Cunningham and N. Muller).

article(s)

  • The role of cognitive and socio-emotional skills in labor markets

    Cognitive skills are more relevant in explaining earnings, socio-emotional skills in determining labor supply and schooling

    Pablo AcostaNoël Muller, October 2018
    Common proxies, such as years of education, have been shown to be ineffective at capturing cross-country differences in skills acquisition, as well as the role they play in the labor market. A large body of research shows that direct measures of skills, in particular cognitive and socio-emotional ones, provide more adequate estimations of individuals’ differences in potential productive capacity than the quantity of education they receive. Evidence shows that cognitive skills in particular are quite relevant to explain wages, while socio-emotional skills are more associated with labor force and education participation decisions.
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