• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.103-138
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• 2011

This paper examines the changes in relative wage of top 10 college graduates to the other college graduates among the age group of 26-28 years using Korean Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS). From 1999 to 2008, the wage differential between top 10 college graduates and the other college graduates increased in South Korea. This wage differential seems to persist along with their age. Within industry wage differential among college graduates also rose but in the late 2000s it became smaller than the wage differential within firm size and industry. Increase in elite college wage premium has led to recent changes in college wage premium.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.75-105
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• 2008

This paper examines the changes over lime in union relative wage effects during the period of 1988 and 2007. The union wage premium was 3.4 percent in average during the last 20 years. It has fallen in the boom years up to the mid-1990s, but has rapidly risen since the Asian financial crisis of 1997. Time series evidence suggests that the union wage premium is counter-cyclical, which means that it responds to economic conditions with a reverse direction. There has been also a fast increase in the unadjusted wage gap relative to regression-adjusted wage gap during the last 10 years in particular, implying favorable changes in the selection of workers into unionized companies.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.29-57
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• 2008

We construct a unique panel data by using Korean Economically Active Population Survey (KEAPS) from 2003 to 2007 to estimate the returns to different types of job mobility among men. By adopting Mincer(1986)'s method, we estimate the wage change to job mobility after controlling the sample selection bias. There are four different types of job mobility that are concerned in the study: (1) voluntary job-to-job changes without experiencing unemployment, (2) voluntary job changes with experiencing unemployment, (3) involuntary job changes due to layoffs, and (4) involuntary job changes due to discharges. Our findings indicate that Korean men who changed jobs without experiencing unemployment realized wage gains of 7% while those who changed jobs through unemployment period lost 10% of their wages. Among those who changed jobs involuntarily and went through unemployment, the workers who discharged from the previous jobs realized substantially greater wage loss.

• Journal of Technologic Dentistry
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.153-178
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• 2000

Dental prosthetic restoration shows a big difference of cost per itemized unit depending on the size of dental labs, facility standard, manpower, and performance. Even the same dental labs have distinctive cost according to manufacturing performance, inflation, and the number of workers. However, in apite of such a change of circumstances, it appears to be quite stable in the relative cost per itemized unit unless the manufacturing trend of particular item changes dramatically. Therefore, if the relative number of cost per itemized unit, which is produced by costing, is indicated, we are able to utilize it effectively as a standard wage estimate. If the wage of dental prosthetic restoration is determined on the basis of cost, it is desirable that the relative value of cost and that of wage are identical. But, by means of comparative analysis, since the relative value of wage reveals mostly lower than that of cost depending on an item, it is considered that the wage is not reflecting the cost approproately. Due to the subdivision and the profession of medical technology, the new development of wage items for dental prosthetic restoration is required. This means that the need for the establishment of new wage items should be presented as the general concept of dental prothetic restroation changes and the level of pathologic technology increases. The current wage structure has differences in the degree of difficulty accroding to unit items and in the cost factors. Nevertheless, the differences are not reflected enough to the wage, so there is potential to lower the medical quality through the use of low-proce materials to avoid the increase of cost and the work process which skips a manufacturing step. The new items of dental prosthetic restoration also increases, but the development of proper numerical value system is not supported. Thus, the right proce is set mostly by applying to the wage of a similar item. Since most wages are established by an individual agreement between the dental clinic institute and the dental labs, the propriety of wage level lacks. Therefore, it is urgent to provide and promote the system of a fair work charge by a standard cost which can be applied to all medical institute.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.253-273
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• 2020

This paper investigates the impact of the effective minimum wage, defined as the log difference between the minimum and the median wages, on wage inequalities in the OECD countries. Unlike the previous studies that focus on single countries in which the minimum wage has no cross-sectional variation and rely instead on within-country variations of wage distribution across regions or socio-economic characteristics, we use a country panel that allows for both cross-sectional and time-series variations in minimum wage. We also control for more factors than in the previous studies whose absence may cause endogeneity. Our results confirm the previous findings that increases in minimum wage alleviate the wage inequality at the lower tail of the wage distribution, while having little effect at the upper tail. The estimated effect is larger for women than for men, which is consistent with the fact that the share of workers who are directly affected by the changes in minimum wage is bigger among women than men. An application of the IVs of Autor, Manning and Smith (2016) supports the robustness of our findings.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.117-146
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• 2012

This study demonstrates the gender difference in the factors that affect job changes and the resulting wage changes in the recent Korean labor market. By using the KEAPS (2003-2007), we found that male workers uniquely tend to stay longer at their current jobs when they have families to support. After controlling self-selection bias, we also found that wage changes resulting from switching jobs differ between male and female workers during this studied period.

• Analyses & Alternatives
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.35-68
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• 2022

In this paper we define wage premium of college hierarchy as a wage differential among college graduates from different universities within the same graduate cohort and estimate the wage premium of college hierarchy for the three different cohorts: namely, 1982, 1992, and 2002. We utilize a unique data set called Education-Labor Market Lifetime Path Survey, which contains education and labor market information about the three different college graduate cohorts. We find that the wage premium of college hierarchy changes over time for the same cohort. It tends to large right after graduation but decrease with labor market experience. When the test score at the time of college entrance controlled, the wage premium of college hierarchy mostly disappears for the 1992 cohort. But for the 2002 cohort it remains seven years after graduation. The difference in the wage premium of college hierarchy can be explained, at least partly, by the number of colleges, college enrollment ratio, and the relation between college hierarchy and the entrance test score.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.29-64
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• 2013

This paper documents the recent changes in wage density and decomposes them. Middle group is found to have shrunk, one-third of which reflects the changes in worker composition. The rest mostly reflects insufficient supply response to the rising skill demand within jobs. The pattern is more pronounced among manufacturing, large and unionized firms, and production workers.

• Korean Journal of Labor Studies
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.47-77
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• 2017

This paper analyzes the changes in wage inequality and its contributing factors since the mid-2000s. Although trends vary by data and wage indices, the Gini coefficient of the total wage of all workers shows an increasing trend due to the part-time increase of less than 35 hours per week, while the wage Gini coefficient of hourly wages and the total wage Gini coefficient of full-time workers showed a declining trend. Part-time increases have increased inequality based on total wages, but part-time hourly wage increases can be considered to have reduced hourly wage inequality. Therefore, as a result of decomposing the factor of Gini coefficient reduction only for full-time workers, factors that contributed absolutely to inequality reduction were variables such as job tenure, career, and occupation, and employment type variable has little effects, and the establishment size variable deepens inequality. The variables such as industry, age, and education did not contribute significantly to the inequality change. This is attributed to the decline in wage premiums for job tenure and management and professional jobs and the increase in wage premiums for large-scale businesses.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.73-101
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• 2021

Employing bunching estimators of Cengiz et al. (2019) for data from the "Economically Active Population Survey," this paper estimates the effect of minimum wage increases on the volume of waged employment for the period 2009-2019. A bunching estimator, which exploits yearly changes in the hourly wage distribution due to the minimum wage hike, can be easily applied to the Korean labor market, which adopts the yearly single national minimum wage. The estimation results suggest that an increase in the annual minimum wage during the period from 2009 to 2019 had a negative effect on the volume of waged employment. A 10% increase in the (real) minimum wage leads to a 1.42~1.74% decrease in the volume of waged employment. Disemployment effects of minimum wage hikes are greater in the sector with a higher proportion of minimum wage workers. It is necessary to carefully consider disemployment effects in determining the level of the minimum wage.