Closing the gap

As shown in the figures, during the past four decades the participation rate of women in labor market grew more or less 20%. The interesting part is that the articles suggested two more minor reasons which might have influenced other than increased demand in office or professional positions, as well as greater education investments. That is, the psychological effect that the daughters have seen their mothers going back to labor market and so took it for granted to be working after marriage and child birth. Also, the rising divorce rate seems calling for the need of woman's own financial support even after marriage.

http://www.economist.com/node/21539928

Jobs on the rise

Positive news in the US economy crisis shows that GDP is rising at 2-2.5 percent this quarter. This equates to more jobs being opened up, and part of the unemployment crisis being averted. Essentially with an increase in the job sector, consumer confidence increases and perhaps the housing industry will even pick back up! Much of this GDP rise is due to the rise in consumption, largely due to Black Friday, the single largest day of consumption in the US calendar year. Approximately 11.4 billion was spent in one day, up vastly from previous years. Skeptics hold, however, that this does not correlate with the US economy growing, more so that people are scared to buy when products are not as cheap.

source: http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20111130PD204.html

Supreme Test for Health Law

A Wall Street Journal article that was published on 11/30/2011 discussed the Supreme Court's review of Obama's health-care program. Although this was perceived by some as the president's signature legislative achievement, the Court is now debating whether or not mandating Americans to carry healthy insurance is within the president's power. This reminded me of FDR's New Deal legislation, and the ways in which it changed the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution. The profound impact that it had on the Federal government's expenditures can be still felt today. Perhaps, Obama's piece of legislation will receive the same response. If it doesn't, though, this may debase his presidency in the eyes of his supporters. A final verdict is expected by the end of June.

The Fed and 5 Central Banks Act in Europe Crisis

The Federal Reserve and other major central banks acted on Monday to lower the cost of temporary dollar loans to European banks. This act will make the European banks easier to manage their debt. It is also trying to reduce the damage on the United States economy because high borrowing interest rate would reduce consumption and investment [Y= C + I + G + (X-IM)], and that would have negative spillovers in the United States. I think it is the best way that the Federal government can do to protect the U.S at this moment, and can give Europeans more time to act on the crisis.

The Role That Higher Education Plays in Black-White Income Gap

An article published by the The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education discussed the role that higher education plays in explaining the black-white income gap. Specifically, it suggested that higher education plays a crucial role in tightening this gap. This reminded me about a few things that we discussed throughout this course. First, we talked about the income gap in 1940, during which time the average black person earned 40% of the wages that the average white man earned. By 1980, this gap got smaller, and blacks earned 80% of the wages that the average white man earned. The factors that contributed to this were migration (from a low wage region to a higher one), years of schooling, and the quality of schooling. This article reveals that, even today, black men with professional degrees earn considerably less than white men with similar degrees. The authors say that this is because white men have a better established clientele and therefore are in a position to charge higher fees. On the other hand, black professionals tend to perform these services exclusively to a black clientele. These clients are usually not in a position to pay large fees for services. As a result, they typically charge less for similar services. Interestingly, the article also highlights that black women tend to earn more relative to black men with similar education credentials. Perhaps, this is because women have a comparative advantage in skilled labor relative to men.

Source: http://www.jbhe.com/news_views/55_closing_the_income_gap.html

Another Credit Crisis and Recession Next Year?

This post is a response to a Wall Street Journal article published by Andy Atkeson, a UCLA Economics professor. His article discusses the relationship between bank stock volatility and economic downturns. He alludes to the Great Depression (1929-1933) during which time volatility reached 9%. He notes that bank volatility has been over 3% in recent days, which he envisions as a warning signal for another disastrous financial panic. In connection to our class, this article reminded me about how the lack of consumer confidence in mid 1930 led to a series of bank panics. In the case of the 1930 bank panics, this caused consumers to convert their deposits into currency, which jeopardized the number of loans that banks could make, and in turn, lowered the money multiplier and the money supply. In a similar sense, Professor Atkeson discusses how the lack of consumer confidence in the soundness of bank balance sheets is reflected in the volatility of the stock market.

Gender Wage Gap

Women and men wage gap has been narrowing since 1980. The reason that the gap have been decreasing is because women invest themselves more compare to the early 20^th century. Women participated in the High School Movement that a lot of them went to high school and college. In 1980s, women were graduating from college in the same numbers as men. Due to the high demand for office workers and women have comparative advantage on knowledge work, wage for women increase. Besides, there is better contraceptive technology such as birth control pill. It contributes an increase of women graduate in college since they can delay their marriage and have a child later in their lives.

Why Women in Asian Countries are Marrying Later in Life

As Asia is growing richer, the attitudes towards sex and marriage are changing. Today, Asian women are now stepping away from their traditional role and traditional family life. One dramatic change is that they are getting married much later on in life. In the richest parts of Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and Hong Kong, the mean age of wedlock for women is now around 30. Another striking change is that some women in Asian are completely turning down the idea of a marriage. The percentage of unmarried women has increased by 20 points since the 1970s. The main reason for this is the increase of education and income among women in Asian countries. Unlike Europe and America, marriage rates in Asia are falling during an economic boom, showing that traditional marriage patterns are changing as Asian countries get richer.

Source:

http://www.economist.com/node/21526329

Female Labor Markets: The Cashier and the Carpenter

Even today, men are still more likely than women to be in paid work. Countries in the OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) experience about 83% of men of working age in the labor market, and about 64% of women. The share of women in the labor force is continuing to rise, closing the gap between men and women. However, even in rich countries, it is nearly impossible to completely close the gap because women are more likely to work shorter hours. Women spend at least twice as much time as men on unpaid work (housework, child care, etc.).

Also, there still exist a continual difference in pay between men and women (except for the highly educated ones) because each gender often works in separate labor markets. Women are more likely to go into teaching, health care, clerical work, social care, and sales. Men are more inclined to go into manual and production jobs, math, physics, science, engineering, and in managerial jobs. A notable trend shows that jobs dominated by women will experience a decrease in relative wage. The most plausible explanation for why women are always at a disadvantage in the labor market is because most of them have children.

Source:

http://www.economist.com/node/21539932

Wages, Income, and Inequality

The Congressional Budget Office has recent released a study of rising inequality, confirming that the top 1% of households have been benefitting incredibly over the past 30 years in after-tax income growth compared to households in the other percentiles. According to the article, the growth in income over the past 30 years is not attributed to hourly wage growth, but rise in annual hours worked and the mass entry of women into the labor force. From 1973 to 2007, the percentage of employed Americans rose significantly. Since 2007, the employment-to-population ratio has plummeted back to the same level as the early 1970s. The data on employment-to-population ratio raise question whether technology productivity was the reason for the decrease in jobs in our economy.

Source:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2011/10/inequality

Why U.S. Companies Aren't So American Anymore

As globalization comes to be really big business to American firms, not only selling products and receiving revenue overseas gained greater portion in their goals, but also hiring cheaper labor force in foreign countries. The exporting of manufacturing or assembling process even more reduce the demand of domestic blue-collar workers. On the other hand, the world market provided much larger pool of fortune to the 'multinationals' shareholders. Not surprisingly, the divergent trend of income distribution would be fueled nothing more than globalization.


http://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/flowchart/2011/06/30/why-us-companies-arent-so-american-anymore

Gender Gap: Women in the Labor Force

“The High Cost of the Gender Gap” was an article in the Wall Street Journal a couple weeks ago. It states that ”Women now graduate from college in greater numbers than men and enter the work force at similar rates. Yet at every career stage, men are more likely to advance than women”. Dominic Barton of McKinsey & Co., Geena Davis, and Debra Lee are interviewed regarding this disparity. Barton expresses that maintaining prominent female presence in the work force isn’t even a matter of being politically correct, it is essential for GDP growth. Debra Lee suggests the CEOs have much responsibility in assuring women are able to reach high executive levels too. This article suggests that much more emphasis needs to be placed on ensuring the gender gap is decreased in executive positions. We discussed in class that we are currently actually in a female labor revolution in comparison to before the 20^th century. Women are constantly changing their lifestyles in terms of childbearing and family-raising to keep up with modern trends. This must be kept in mind when companies are making the decision to invest in their female capital.

iPad in Banking Business

This article relates to technology and productivity. After the invention of mobile computing, mobile devices have become more and more powerful and portable. Standard Chartered Bank makes use Apple iPads and iPhones to increase employees productivity and also the relationship between their customers. Standard Chartered Bank has developed more than a dozen in-house iPhone apps, which qualified employees can download from an internal app store, the Standard Chartered App Centre.

Source: http://www.apple.com/ipad/business/profiles/standard-chartered/