Local human capital, segregation by skill, and skill-specific employment growth*

Innovation, Skill, and Economic Segregation

Our research examines the role of innovation and skill on the level economic segregation across U.S. metro areas. On the one hand, economic and urban theory suggest that more innovative and skilled metros are likely to have higher levels of economic segregation. But on the other hand, theory also suggests that more segregated metros are likely to become less innovative over time. We examine the...

Skill networks and measures of complex human capital

We propose a network-based method for measuring worker skills. We illustrate the method using data from an online freelance website. Using the tools of network analysis, we divide skills into endogenous categories based on their relationship with other skills in the market. Workers who specialize in these different areas earn dramatically different wages. We then show that, in this market, netw...

Social Interactions and Segregation in Skill Accumulation

This paper studies human capital investment in a spatial setting with interpersonal complementarities. A mixture of local and global social interactions affect the cost of acquiring education, and the return to human capital is determined endogenously in the market. We study how spatially segregated investment equilibria are affected by an increase in the relative importance of global vis-á-vis...

Social Preferences, Skill Segregation, and Wage Dynamics

We study the earning structure and the equilibrium assignment of workers to firms in a model in which workers have social preferences, and skills are perfectly substitutable in production. Firms offer long-term contracts, and we allow for frictions in the labour market in the form of mobility costs. The model delivers specific predictions about the nature of worker flows, about the characterist...

Skill Acquisition and Interface Loyalty: A Human Capital Perspective