TY  - JOUR
AU  - Averett,Susan
AU  - Bodenhorn,Howard
AU  - Staisiunas,Justas
TI  - Unemployment Risk and Compensating Differential in Late-Nineteenth Century New Jersey Manufacturing
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 9977
PY  - 2003
Y2  - September 2003
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9977
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9977.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Susan Averett
Simon Center
Dept. of Economics
Lafayette College
Easton, PA 18042
E-Mail: AVERETTS@LAFAYETTE.EDU

Howard Bodenhorn
John E. Walker Department of Economics
College of Business and Behavioral Science
201-B Sirrine Hall
Clemson University
Clemson, SC 29634
Tel: 864/656-4335
E-Mail: bodenhorn@gmail.com
AB  - In this paper we test for the existence of compensating differentials for unemployment risk in an era before unemployment insurance. Using information gathered from manufacturing worker surveys conducted during the 1880s in New Jersey, we find that workers who faced higher probabilities of predictable unemployment spells received a small compensating differential. Low-skill laborers and operatives were partially compensated for unemployment risks; skilled craftsmen were not. Although workers were not fully compensated for the unemployment risks they accepted, the results are of interest because most previous writers, dating back to Adam Smith, doubted the existence of compensating differentials in manufacturing. Differentials are typically believed to arise in employments with pronounced seasonal components, such as agriculture and construction.
ER  -