TY  - JOUR
AU  - Berndt,Ernst R.
AU  - Morrison,Catherine J.
AU  - Rosenblum,Larry S.
TI  - High-Tech Capital Formation and Labor Composition in U.S. Manufacturing Industries: An Exploratory Analysis
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 4010
PY  - 1992
Y2  - March 1992
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w4010
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w4010.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Ernst R. Berndt
MIT Sloan School of Management
100 Main Street, E62-518
Cambridge, MA 02142
Tel: 617/253-2665
Fax: 617-227-0880
E-Mail: eberndt@mit.edu

Catherine J. Morrison
Department of Agricultural Economics
UC, Davis
Davis, CA  95616
Tel: 617/381-3560
E-Mail: no email available
AB  - In this paper we report results of an exploratory empirical effort examining relationships between investments in high-tech information technology capital and the distribution of employment, both by occupation and by level of educational attainment. Our data cover the two-digit U.S. manufacturing industries. annually, 1968-86. We find that increases in the high-tech composition of capital (OF/K) are positively related to growth in white collar. non-production worker hours, and that increases in white collar hours account for most of the reduction in aggregate labor productivity associated with increases in high-tech capital. In terms of educational attainment, within the blue collar occupations we find clear evidence in support of skill upgrading toward more educated workers occurring along with increases in OF/K. While point estimates are not very precise, among white collar occupations we find that hours provided by the least and most educated workers increase with OF/K, while hours provided by those with high-school and some college education are adversely affected.
ER  -