Workers’ earnings depend on their skills and the value of those skills in the market. Although researchers commonly use educational attainment to proxy for skill level, individuals with the same years of schooling vary greatly in the skills that they have acquired. Considerable research has focused on the returns to cognitive skills, but there is growing recognition that non-cognitive abilities also have significant effects on labor market outcomes. The returns to skill appear to have differed substantially across countries and over time, with corresponding implications for the inequality of earnings and household incomes.
The aim of the 2018 workshop of IZA’s “Labor Statistics” program area is to bring together senior and junior researchers to discuss their recent empirical research related to skill attainment and the returns to skill in the labor market. We particularly encourage submissions of papers that present new evidence on:
- The acquisition of market-relevant skills
- Job requirements and the demand for skills
- Cross-country differences in the returns to skill
- Changes over time in the returns to skill
Preference will be given to papers that have an explicit measurement focus, for example, by developing new measures of cognitive or non-cognitive skills or making use of novel data—including data from surveys, administrative records, linked data sets, or proprietary sources—to address substantive questions related to the role of skill in the labor market.
Researchers interested in participating should submit a full paper or extended abstract by December 18, 2017.
Notification of acceptance will be provided by January 10, 2018.