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Professor Benjamin Schoefer, Ph.D.

Professor Benjamin Schoefer, Ph.D.
Aktuelle Position

seit 5/22

Research Fellow der Abteilung Gesetzgebung, Regulierung und Faktormärkte

Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung Halle (IWH)

seit 7/22

Associate Professor

University of California, Berkeley

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Forschungsschwerpunkte
  • Makroökonomik
  • Arbeitsmarktökonomik
  • Corporate Finance

Benjamin Schoefer ist seit Mai 2022 Research Fellow am IWH. Seine Forschungsinteressen umfassen die Bereiche Makroökonomik, Arbeitsmarktökonomik sowie Corporate Finance.

Benjamin Schoefer unterrichtet im Department of Economics an der University of California, Berkeley. Er studierte und promovierte an der Harvard University.

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Professor Benjamin Schoefer, Ph.D.
Professor Benjamin Schoefer, Ph.D.
- Abteilung Gesetzgebung, Regulierung und Faktormärkte
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Publikationen

Zitationen
1377

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Reservation Raises: The Aggregate Labour Supply Curve at the Extensive Margin

Preston Mui Benjamin Schoefer

in: Review of Economic Studies, im Erscheinen

Abstract

<p>We measure desired labour supply at the extensive (employment) margin in two representative surveys of the U.S. and German populations. We elicit reservation raises: the percent wage change that renders a given individual indifferent between employment and nonemployment. It is equal to her reservation wage divided by her actual, or potential, wage. The reservation raise distribution is the nonparametric aggregate labour supply curve. Locally, the curve exhibits large short-run elasticities above 3, consistent with business cycle evidence. For larger upward shifts, arc elasticities shrink towards 0.5, consistent with quasi-experimental evidence from tax holidays. Existing models fail to match this nonconstant, asymmetric curve.</p>

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Productivity, Place, and Plants

Benjamin Schoefer Oren Ziv

in: Review of Economics and Statistics, Nr. 5, 2024

Abstract

<p>Why do cities differ so much in productivity? A long literature has sought out systematic sources, such as inherent productivity advantages, market access, agglomeration forces, or sorting. We document that up to three quarters of the measured regional productivity dispersion is spurious, reflecting the “luck of the draw” of finite counts of idiosyncratically heterogeneous plants that happen to operate in a given location. The patterns are even more pronounced for new plants, hold for alternative productivity measures, and broadly extend to European countries. This large role for individual plants suggests a smaller role for places in driving regional differences.</p>

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Worker Beliefs about Outside Options

Simon Jäger Christopher Roth Nina Roussille Benjamin Schoefer

in: Quarterly Journal of Economics, Nr. 3, 2024

Abstract

<p>Standard labor market models assume that workers hold accurate beliefs about the external wage distribution, and hence their outside options with other employers. We test this assumption by comparing German workers’ beliefs about outside options with objective benchmarks. First, we find that workers wrongly anchor their beliefs about outside options on their current wage: workers that would experience a 10% wage change if switching to their outside option only expect a 1% change. Second, workers in low-paying firms underestimate wages elsewhere. Third, in response to information about the wages of similar workers, respondents correct their beliefs about their outside options and change their job search and wage negotiation intentions. Finally, we analyze the consequences of anchoring in a simple equilibrium model. In the model, anchored beliefs keep overly pessimistic workers stuck in low-wage jobs, which gives rise to monopsony power and labor market segmentation.</p>

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Arbeitspapiere

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From Labor to Intermediates: Firm Growth, Input Substitution, and Monopsony

Matthias Mertens Benjamin Schoefer

in: IWH Discussion Papers, Nr. 24, 2024

Abstract

<p>We document and dissect a new stylized fact about firm growth: the shift from labor to intermediate inputs. This shift occurs in input quantities, cost and output shares, and output elasticities. We establish this fact using German firm-level data and replicate it in administrative firm data from 11 additional countries. We also document these patterns in micro-aggregated industry data for 20 European countries (and, with respect to industry cost shares, for the US). We rationalize this novel regularity within a parsimonious model featuring (i) an elasticity of substitution between intermediates and labor that exceeds unity, and (ii) an increasing shadow price of labor relative to intermediates, due to monopsony power over labor or labor adjustment costs. The shift from labor to intermediates accounts for one half to one third of the decline in the labor share in growing firms (the remainder is due to wage markdowns and markups) and rationalizes most of the labor share decline in growing industries.</p>

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The Financial Channel of Wage Rigidity

Benjamin Schoefer

in: Econometrics Laboratory (EML), April 2022

Abstract

I propose a financial channel of wage rigidity. In recessions, rigid average wages squeeze cash flows, forcing firms to cut hiring due to financial constraints. Indeed, empirical cash flows and profits would turn acyclical if wages were only moderately more procyclical. I study this channel in a search and matching model with financial constraints and wage rigidity among incumbent workers (but flexible new hires’ wages). While neither feature generates amplification individually, their interaction can account for much of the empirical labor market fluctuations—breaking the neutrality of incumbents’ wages for hiring, and showing that financial amplification of business cycles requires wage rigidity.

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