• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.1-39
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• 2007

This study focuses on the possibility that skill-biased technological change is one of the factors for relatively poor employment conditions of the unskilled after the economic crisis. Increasing employment share of skilled workers accompanying with rising wage premium for education since implies that labor demand has shifted toward the skilled. The decomposition of changes in wage share of skilled workers into between-industry and within-industry changes suggests that the increase in the demand for skilled labor has been largely due to within-industry changes, which can be seen as reflecting the effect of the skill-biased technological change. Also the regression results indicate that the employment share of skilled workers has more rapidly increased in the industries with higher ICT (Information Communication Technology) investment intensity since the mid 1990s, hinting to the possibility that skill-biased technological changes may have come from ICT.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.60 no.3
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• pp.31-58
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• 2008

This study examines applying the elderly poverty labor hypothesis and skill-biased technological change hypothesis to labor force participation rate(LFPR) of older males in Korea. These hypotheses have hardly been examined on the this group. The analysis is based on the data "Summary of economically active population($1965{\sim}2007$)", "Population projection($1965{\sim}2007$)", "Report on wage structure survey($1993{\sim}2005$)" and "Korea Labor and Income Panel Study($1998{\sim}2006$)". The method employed for this study is logistic regression. The main results from this analysis are summarized in five points. Firstly, Korean older males' LFPR have been increasing since 1965 when industrialization was expanding at full steam. This trend has been different from the decreasing trend of industrialized countries. The second finding is that poor older males' LFPR is, on the average, 5.2% higher than that of non-poor older males from 1998 to 2005. The third result is that the non-elderly man has been increasingly positioned at higher grade occupations, while the elderly man has been held at lower grade occupations. The fourth is that labor demand for highly educated workers has exceeded the increased labor supply of the group, while the demand for low educated workers has decreased far beyond the declined labor supply. As a result, college premium has increased from 139% in 1993 to 157.8% in 2005. The final main implication of this study is that the industrialization theory and modernization hypothesis still holds for the LFPR of Korean older males. However, the elderly affluence hypothesis of the LFPR of older males are hardly persuasive in explaining Korean phenomenon. Especially, we find that the elderly poverty is the main mechanism in determining the Korean LFPR in old ages. This supports the elderly poverty labor hypothesis presented in this study. Skill-biased technological change hypothesis partially explains the LFPR of older man. However, we believe that other factors; human capital specially high school education rather than university education and skill required in less skill biased occupations or the poverty; also have taken effect.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.135-164
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• 2010

This paper compares the earnings effect of inter-industry technology differences between the self-employed and wage earners. It is assumed that primary skills utilized by the self-employed and paid workers differ in nature, and thus the earnings effect of technology differences and its skill-biasness also differ for each type of workers. For the empirical analysis. Heckman's two-stage method and quantile regressions are fitted to Korean panel data. The earnings effect of technology differences turns skill- biased for wage earners (job-specific skills), but prevails for all self-employed workers (entrepreneurial skills) regardless of their schooling level. This sectoral difference holds for each different quantile of earnings distribution.