This thesis investigates the motivation behind individuals’ decision to migrate, the impact of migration on the host countries’ economies, and finally the impact of high skilled emigration on the human capital level in origin countries. Chapter 1 investigates whether ICT facilitates migration flows from origin to host countries based on the magnitude of the flows. Chapter 2 investigates the productivity effects of migration in four European Union (EU) countries: the UK, Spain and the Netherlands for 1995-2008 and Germany for 2002-2008. This analysis was carried out using EU Labour Force Survey (LFS) and EU-KLEMS data. We apply the Pooled Mean Group (PMG) variant for the autoregressive distributed-lag (ARDL) estimator. Various findings are presented in order to distinguish between EU and non-EU origins as well as the skill level of migrants. Chapter 3 contributes an insightful panel data analysis of human capital and high skilled emigration for 74 origin countries from 1980 to 2000 with a five-year frequency. We find a significant negative brain drain impact of high skilled emigration across countries sampled.

Over the last 30 years, the number of people not in work or looking for work because of long-term sickness or disability in Britain has grown substantially. Between 1981 and 2006, the working-age caseload swelled by 1.72m while those describing themselves as long-term sick or disabled in surveys increased by 1.35m. This thesis investigates this phenomenon of sickness-related economic inactivity (SREI) in Britain across three dimensions: space, people and time. A range of datasets and quantitative analysis are employed to describe and account for the geographical distribution and expansion over time of working-age SREI, across five economic clusters and 64 counties of Britain. Theoretical triangulation is used to organise the evidence on what factors are associated with SREI by place and time. Next, labour market accounts are assembled to describe the dynamics of labour market change (including SREI) between 1981 and 2001 in Prospering Britain, the Conurbations and Industrial Legacy counties and identify factors most strongly associated with withdrawal into SREI outside of Greater London and Rural & Coastal Britain. Two chapters then use a range of datasets, including the British Cohort Study, to describe and account for the geographic distribution and growth in young adult SREI in Britain. The main findings of the thesis are broadly supportive of the ‘hidden unemployment’ theory advanced by Beatty and Fothergill (1996). Unbalanced employment growth between local labour markets, coupled with persistent inequalities in health and skills and an unsympathetic unemployment benefits system, is likely to account in large part for withdrawal into SREI. The change can also be understood as one aspect of broader polarisation between places and families across Britain, which was only checked between the late 1990s and early 2000s. Policy implications that may prove beneficial to addressing this problem (and preventing its re-occurrence in a new guise) include: a commitment to full employment, through addressing deficits in skills and local labour market demand; renewed action on inequalities in public health; and benefits reforms that both keep the unemployed healthy and support sustained employment.

Why do people work in the voluntary sector? Is the sector distinct, with characteristics that differentiate it from the private and public sectors? Is it important to consider the existence of the so-called ‘third sector’ when analysing behaviour in the labour market? Is altruism really an important motivation for workers in this sector? This dissertation is concerned specifically with the labour market in the voluntary sector: that is, workers who are the paid employees of independent nonprofit organisations. Using a large, national dataset, we explore empirically the predictions of the economic theory of voluntary organisations. In particular, is there evidence for a ‘warm glow’, the extra utility that workers receive for working towards a goal that they share with their employer? Does this glow exist, and is it brighter in the voluntary sector? We examine in turn sector differences in wages, working hours, and find evidence that employment in the voluntary sector is significantly different in some characteristics from both the private and public sectors. The main economic theories of voluntary sector wage-setting rely on some formulation of ‘warm glow’ utility or intrinsic motivation derived from working for an organisation with a mission shared by motivated employees. This leads to a prediction of lower wages in the voluntary sector. The empirical findings in the existing literature have focussed on US data, and the results have been mixed. Using pooled cross-sectional and panel datasets based on UK employment data between 1997 and 2007, we show that there is some evidence of warm-glow wage discounts in the sector for male workers, but that these wage differences have been eroded as the sector has grown. Although there is not a significant sector wage difference found for women, there is evidence that they have also experienced faster wage growth in the voluntary sector than the private. There are significant sector differences in working hours within the Health & Social Work industries, particularly in overtime working. Workers in the voluntary sector work more hours of unpaid overtime, whilst those in the private sector work more hours of paid overtime. Controlling for overtime hours has a significant effect on sector wage differentials. In particular, accounting for unpaid overtime results in evidence of a warm-glow wage discount for female workers. We analyse this data at a time when the sector has been growing dramatically, driven by government policy to reform public services. Our findings suggest that this policy has had unintended consequences for the voluntary sector labour market.

Η άποψη ότι κατά τη διάρκεια των τελευταίων χρόνων είμαστε μάρτυρες θεαματικών εξελίξεων στις τεχνολογίες πληροφοριών και επικοινωνιών είναι πλέον κοινός τόπος. Οι εξελίξεις, όμως αυτές, επηρεάζουν άμεσα τη παραγωγικότητα της εργασίας με συνέπεια τη μετάλλαξη και του ίδιου του εργασιακού περιβάλλοντος τόσο ποιοτικά όσο και ποσοτικά. Οι έννοιες της πληροφορίας και της γνώσης αποκτούν ιδιαίτερη σημασία στο νέο τεχνο-οικονομικό παράδειγμα που ουσιαστικά βασίζεται σε αυτές, αναπτύσσοντας καινοτομικές δραστηριότητες στη παραγωγική διαδικασία, στις δεξιότητες των εργαζομένων και στη λειτουργία των επιχειρήσεων γενικότερα. Η ολοένα και πιο έντονη, όμως, εισροή των τεχνολογιών πληροφορικής και επικοινωνιών, ενώ δημιουργεί νέες αγορές και νέα προϊόντα και άρα αυξάνει τις θέσεις εργασίας, παράλληλα εκτοπίζει εργατικό δυναμικό αφού πλέον η μηχανή αντικαθιστά τον άνθρωπο. Αποτέλεσμα αυτού, οι αλλαγές στις εργασιακές σχέσεις και νέες προκλήσεις τόσο στην εκπαίδευση όσο και στον εργαζόμενο και την επιχείρηση. Η παρούσα διπλωματική εργασία αναλύει τις αλλαγές που επιφέρει στην απασχόληση η τεχνολογία πληροφοριών και επικοινωνιών και παρουσιάζει τα στοιχεία που συνθέτουν τη νέα οικονομία στην οποία είμαστε ήδη εισηγμένοι. Παράλληλα, προσδιορίζει τις επιδράσεις της νέας τεχνολογίας και τις προκλήσεις που δημιουργούνται μέσα από αυτή. / The fact that last years we are witnesses of spectacular developments in the technologies of information and communications is worldwide accepted. However, these developments influence directly the productivity of work and the result of this is the mutation of the labour environment in quantity and quality. The significances of information and knowledge acquire particular importance in the new [techno]- economic example which substantially is based on them, developing innovative activities in the productive process, in the skills of employees and in the operation of business generally. However the continuously surge of technologies of information and communications, while it creates new markets and new products and increases the employment and at the same time displaces workforce with machines. As a result of this, are the changes in the labour relations and new challenges in the education and business. The present diplomatic thesis analyzes the changes that effect in the employment because of the technology of information and communications and presents the elements that compose the new economy in which we have been already in. At the same time, it determines the effects of new technology and the challenges that are created through this.

This thesis examined the early labour market experiences of graduates from different class backgrounds at three differentially ranked universities. It finds that outcomes are more than the sum of credentials and hard work. Access to social, economic and non-academic forms of cultural capital is found to be important and graduates from middle class backgrounds are more likely than graduates from working class backgrounds to access the forms of capital recognised by the graduate labour market. This leads to observable differences in graduate labour market outcomes. However, the complex relationship between higher education and the graduate labour market means that class differences are not simply reproduced. In the first instance, patterns in graduate labour market outcomes are a product of the academic requirements demanded by certain occupations. These academic barriers are tangible and affect all graduates regardless of background. Graduates with more prestigious credentials are more likely to access professional or managerial occupations and are more likely to find traditional graduate employment: the proportion of middle class graduates employed in professional or managerial occupations was 100% at the Elite University, 79% at the Russell Group University and 69% at the Post-1992 University. This compares with figures of 100%, 56% and 31%, respectively, for working class graduates. However, labour market success is also predicated upon exhibiting the ‘right’ combination of competencies and experiences, privileging middle class graduates. Middle class graduates have greater access to economic capital, are able to leverage their social networks to augment their employability, and are more likely to exhibit ways of being and doing associated with professional and managerial competence. As such, intra-university comparisons find that middle class graduates are more likely to access graduate employment (79% of Russell Group University middle class graduates were in graduate employment compared to 22% of working class graduates) and work in professional or managerial occupations (see figures above). These observations can be attributed to significant differences in economic, social and cultural capital. However, such comparisons conceal subtle in-group differences. This thesis identified distinct class fractions within both the middle and working class groups. An interesting distinction within the middle classes was that between middle class graduates with parents employed in the public/third sectors and those with parents employed in the private sector. For instance, 80% of graduates in the public sector had one or more parents employed by the public sector and almost 60% had both parents employed by the public sector, which constituted all of those with both parents employed by the public sector. All of the graduates in the private sector had at least one parent employed by the sector and 74% had both parents employed by the sector, constituting 85% of graduates with both parents employed in the private sector. The same pattern did not emerge for working class graduates. The sector of parental employment is significant because it reflects systematic differences in social and political orientation, which for graduates give rise to discernible differences in their inherited labour market orientation, social networks and cultural capital. The graduate labour market outcomes of working class graduates are acutely tied to the institutions they attend and their experiences therein. Unlike many middle class graduates, working class graduates do not inherit forms of social and cultural capital that can be easily realised in the graduate labour market. As such, differences between working class fractions can be traced to differences in educational achievement and trajectory. Through the acculturation of middle class behaviours and alignment of practices, working class graduates benefit from the institutional proximity to middle class peers and become caught in their ‘slip stream’. The benefits are clear to see: 65% of elite trajectory graduates were in traditional graduate employment and 94% were in professional or managerial occupations. For modal trajectory graduates mediocre credentials and low levels of inherited social and cultural capital are compounded by socially segregated institutional experiences. Consequently, they were found in the least competitive regions of the graduate labour market, typically in non-graduate employment and in occupations that did not require a degree-level education. These findings add to our understanding of how class background, higher education and the graduate labour market interact. They raise some important questions for the academic field but also for public policy, particularly around the role of higher education in promoting social mobility and its relationship with the (graduate) labour market.

This PhD study centres on analysing the changing employment service portfolios available to disadvantaged people out of work in Britain and Germany. Looking at the recent wave of comparative studies on ‘activation’ reforms, it springs to mind that the question of the changing portfolio of ‘active’ labour market policy (ALMP) measures has received only little attention in the sense of a rigorous comparative analysis. In order to address that gap, this study develops a novel normative and analytical perspective for the study of ALMP, which then is applied to the empirical cases Britain and Germany. I first develop the concept of personalisation as the normative and analytical framework for the analysis of ALMP. I show that the diversity of ALMP portfolios, which is a precondition for a personalised service provision, can serve as a proxy for measuring personalisation. Equipped with this analytical tool, the analysis subsequently focuses on the changes to ALMP portfolios over the past 15 years in terms of diversity. It is shown that during this period both Britain and Germany reformed working-age benefits in a way that led to a closer integration of the benefit system at an institutional level. Taking the policy rhetoric that closer integration will lead to more ‘personalised’ (UK) or more ‘tailor-made’ (Germany) services as a starting point, I analyse whether these developments at an institutional level have indeed led to a more personalised, or more diverse, provision of employment services. This study looks in particular at the situation of those groups in the two countries who have been most affected by recent integration reforms. These have primarily been claimants of second-tier working-age benefits, namely incapacity related benefits in the UK, and ‘Sozialhilfe’ (SH, social assistance) and ‘Arbeitslosengeld II’ (ALGII, Unemployment Benefit II) in Germany. I find that in both countries, employment services for claimants of these second-tier benefits have become more diverse in the wake of the integration reforms of the past 10 to 15 years, thereby increasing their personalisation potential. However, the two countries have each followed very specific reform trajectories. While the volume and coverage of ALMP have increased in both countries, the portfolio of services for second-tier claimants today is much more diverse in Germany than in Britain. This is primarily due to the existence of a large volume of services directed at claimants more distant from the labour market that follow a social integration & employability approach. These services are more marginal in Britain, where measures that follow a work-first approach are dominant. This divergent development is indicative of major and persistent differences in terms of ideational context as well as institutional (operational) factors. New Public Management reforms have influenced operational policy to different degrees in the two countries, effectively limiting the diversity of employment services in Britain more than in Germany.

This thesis entitled “Essays on Human Capital” is comprised of three essays on various aspects of human capital and its effects on firms and labor markets. Chapter 1 provides an overview. In Chapter 2 we estimate the effects of human capital on firm-level management practices. We adopt an instrumental variables strategy to overcome the potential endogeneity of human capital. Starting with data on management practices from the World Management Survey, we geocode the locations of more than 6,000 manufacturing plants in 19 countries. Then, we calculate driving times to universities in the World Higher Education Database. Using distance as an instrument for human capital, we estimate that every one standard deviation increase in the share of workers with a university degree leads to 0.5 of a standard deviation improvement in management. These findings are robust to a battery of checks and a placebo instrument using distances to world heritage sites. We show that both managers’ and non-managers’ human capital matter. In Chapter 3 we estimate the effects of university degree class on initial labor market outcomes. We employ a regression discontinuity design which utilizes university rules governing the award of degrees. We find sizeable and significant effects for Upper Second degrees and positive but smaller effects for First Class degrees on wages. A First Class is worth roughly 3 percent in starting wages which translates into $1,000 per annum. An Upper Second is worth more-7 percent in starting wages which is roughly $2,040. We interpret these results as the signaling effects of degree class and provide evidence consistent with this. Finally in Chapter 4 we study the labor market effects of increased automation. We build a model in which firms optimally design machines, train workers, and assign these factors to tasks. Borrowing concepts from computer science and robotics, the model features tasks which are difficult from an engineering perspective but easy for humans to carry out due to innate capacities for functions like vision, movement, and communication. In equilibrium, firms assign low-skill workers to such tasks. High skill workers have a comparative advantage in tasks which require much training and are difficult to automate. Workers in the middle of the skill distribution perform tasks of intermediate difficulty on both dimensions. When the cost of designing machines falls, firms adopt machines mainly in tasks that were previously performed by middle-skill workers. Occupations at both the bottom and the top of the wage distribution experience employment gains. The wage distribution becomes more dispersed near the top but compressed near the bottom. As design costs fall further, only the most skilled workers enjoy rising skill premiums, and an increasing fraction of the labor force is employed in jobs that require little or no training. The model’s implications are consistent with recent evidence of job polarization and a hollowing-out of the wage distribution. In addition, the model yields novel predictions about trends in occupational training requirements that are consistent with evidence we present.

La migration façonne la manière dont les sociétés évoluent dans les pays de destination, mais également dans les pays d'origine. Dans un contexte où l'attention des chercheurs se tourne progressivement de l'impact de la migration sur les pays d'accueil vers son impact sur les pays d'origine, cette thèse propose quatre aperçus des liens entre la migration internationale et les marchés de travail dans les pays d'origine. Chaque essai illustre ces interactions entre l'emploi local et la migration dans plusieurs pays de la région Moyen Orient et Afrique du Nord, combinant l'analyse micro et macroéconomique, les données quantitatives et qualitatives, la modélisation en équilibre général calculable et la microéconométrie. Le premier chapitre présente un modèle d'équilibre général calculable original qui permet de mettre en évidence les principaux canaux à travers lesquels la migration a des répercussions sur le marché du travail: l'offre de travail, les transferts de fonds et l'éducation. Dans les trois chapitres suivants, j'analyse en profondeur les fondements microéconomiques et les implications de chacun de ces canaux. / Migration shapes societies in both origin and destination countries. With scholars' focus progressively turning from the impact of migration on receiving countries towards its impact on sending countries, this thesis offers four insights on the interlinkages between international migration and labour markets in origin countries. Each essay illustrates these interactions between local employment and migration in several countries of the Middle East and North Africa region, combining micro and macroeconomic analysis, quantitative and qualitative data, computable general equilibrium modeling and microeconometrics. The first chapter presents an original computable general equilibrium model which allows us to capture the broad channels though which migration impacts labour market outcomes: labour supply, remittances and education. In the following three chapters, we explore in depth the microeconomic foundations and implications of each of these channels.

This thesis investigates the dynamics, motivations and external factors influencing the migration trajectories of 22 young, well-qualified Polish and Spanish migrants in the South of England. The study is among the first ones researching the current movement of people from Spain to the UK in the aftermath of the global financial crisis of 2007/08, and comparing it to post-EU-accession migration from Eastern Europe. The methodology involves semi-structured, autobiographical interviews focusing on participants’ migration experiences, with a particular focus on their professional ambitions in the UK labour market. The findings of the study demonstrate how both groups interpret emigration as an act of establishing a certain form of normality, be it social, economic or individual. Overall, however, the narratives reveal differences that run along the lines of nationality. In the Polish narratives in particular, a strong focus on the immediate present becomes evident. The present life in the UK, no matter how challenging, is almost always compared to a past in Poland that is retrospectively defined as ‘abnormal’. Participants create a discourse of escape that is then used to make sense of an often ‘not ideal’ present in which participants, despite being university educated, spend prolonged periods of time in low-level jobs. The Spanish narratives, on the other hand, tend to be highly politicised and participants display a strong sense of individualisation and political anger. Most narratives are characterised by an ‘ideology of progress’. Spain is referred to as a space of personal and professional stagnation, while time spent in the UK is seen as a conscious investment in human capital such as English skills. The aim of this investment is the establishment of a certain socio-economic status in the future, and menial jobs in the UK are acceptable as long as participants work towards that goal. In summary, the thesis analyses how both groups react to social and economic changes in times of a global economic crisis, and describes how participants tend to meet unknown circumstances with a known set of behavioural dispositions.

This thesis covers the analysis of current UK economic issues relating to immigration and the labour market. In particular, since the late 1990s, the UK has experienced increasing immigration inflows significantly affecting both the economy and society as a whole. In parallel, over the last two decades the country has undergone other substantial changes in the structure of the labour market, primarily due to an intrinsic rapid educational upgrading and the pervasive effect of technological change. Chapter 1 studies immigrant assimilation by comparing the life satisfaction of immigrants across different generations against that of their native peers. Chapter 2 develops and empircally tests a model to explain the channels through which heterogeneous firms may adjust their product and process innovation activities in response to local labour supply shocks such as immigration inflows. Chapter 3 estimates the causal effect of technological exposure on UK local labour markets while providing suggestive evidence on the role of changes in the composition of the labour force.