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Unemployment, employment contracts, and compensating wage differentials: michigan in the 1890s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Timothy J. Hatton  and
Jeffrey G. Williamson
Timothy J. Hatton
Affiliation:
Senior Lecturer in Economics, University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, England CO4 3SQ.
Jeffrey G. Williamson
Affiliation:
Laird Bell Professor of Economics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138.
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Abstract

Surveys taken by the Michigan Bureau of Labor and Industrial Statistics in the 1890s reveal that unemployment was pervasive among unskilled workers. The incidence of unemployment was not associated with personal characteristics, but rather with the type of employment contract and job: those with high risk of layoff commanded a wage premium. Seasonality is an important part of this late nineteenth-century story, and the subsequent demise of seasonal activities may have had an important impact on the evolution of labor market institutions.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , September 1991 , pp. 605 - 632
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1991

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