Transitions through the Labor Market: Work, Occupation, Earnings and Retirement (Research in Labor Economics, 46)

Understanding the factors that affect how one transitions from school to the labor market and finally to retirement is important both to the individual and to the policy maker. This volume contains seven original and innovative articles that analyze aspects of such labor market transitions. Questions answered include: How did hiring and firing decisions change for blacks and Hispanics relative to whites in the Great Recession? Can redesigning the minimum wage lead to more efficient employment transitions and greater social welfare? What are the factors leading a company to fast-track an employee? How does the number of layers in a company’s hierarchical structure affect one’s ability to be promoted? Do women gravitate to more socially caring occupations because they care more than men? Does gaming among youth increase math scores more for boys than girls? And, does good health impede one’s inclination to retire?

Solomon W. Polachek is a Distinguished Professor at the State University of New York at Binghamton (Binghamton University), where he has taught since 1983. His Ph.D. is from Columbia University, and he has had post-doctoral fellowships at the University of Chicago and Stanford University, and visiting faculty appointments at the Catholic University of Leuven, Tel Aviv and Bar Ilan Universities, Princeton, and Kasetsart University.