Publication: Skill biased technical change and wage ınequality : evidence from Turkish manufacturing sector
Abstract
Her ne kadar ücret eşitsizliği olgusu, iktisat biliminde ölmeyen bir tartışma olsa da, 1970'lerden sonra, yeniden doğuşu ve öne çıkması, ABD'deki ücret eşitsizliğinin yükselişine borçludur. O zamandan beri, bu artışın ardındaki dinamikleri ortaya çıkarmak için pek çok çaba sarf edildi ve Beceri Yanlı Teknik Değişim tartışmanın merkez üssü haline geldi. Beceri Yanlı Teknik Değişim veya Uygun Teknoloji, artan üretkenlik yoluyla dahil olan emeği destekleyerek hem beceri grupları arasında hem de beceri grupları içinde ücretleri değiştirir. Bu tezin temel amacı, beceri yanlı teknik değişim ve genel amaçlı teknoloji şeklindeki varsayımsal ve örtük teknoloji şoklarının Türk imalat sektörü üzerindeki etkilerini göstermektir. 2004 ve 2015 yılları arasındaki HİA verilerini kullanarak, teknoloji değişimlerinin seyri farklı olsaydı ne olacağını anlamak için karşıolgusal ücret dağılımları oluşturulmuştur. Katkılarımız, bu çerçevede karşı-olgusal yöntemin kullanılması; DFL yönteminin yeniden parametrelendirilmesi vasıtasıyla beceri yanlı teknolojinin yeni ölçümü ve mikro düzeyde veriler kullanılarak Türk imalat sektörüne uygulanmasından kaynaklanmaktadır. Ana sonuçlar şu şekilde sıralanabilir: SBTC'nin etkileri GPT'nin etkilerinden daha büyüktü; teknoloji boyutu beceri boyutundan daha yapısal ve ücret değişikliklerine karşı daha dirençliydi; ücret seviyesi ile ücret eşitsizliği arasında bir değiş tokuş vardı ve son olarak, farklı yüzdelik gruplar için, teknoloji şokları oldukça çeşitli sonuçlar meydana getirmişti.
Although the wage inequality phenomenon has an evergreen debate in economics, its rebirth and salience, after the 1970s, is indebted to the upsurge of wage inequality in the USA. Since then, many efforts have been put to reveal the dynamics behind this increase, and Skill Biased Technical Change turned out to be the epicenter of the discussion. Skill Biased Technical Change or Appropriate Technology alters wages both between skill groups and within skill groups by favoring the labor involved via increased productivity. The main target of this dissertation is to display the effects of hypothetical and implied technology shocks in the form of skill biased technical change and general purpose technology on the Turkish manufacturing sector. Using HLFS data between 2004 and 2015, counterfactual wage distributions were constructed to understand what would have happened if the course of technology changes were different. Our contributions stem from the utilization of the counterfactual method within that framework, the newfangled quantification of skill biased technology by re-parametrization of the DFL method, and application to the Turkish manufacturing sector using micro-level data. The main results can be listed as followings: the effects of SBTC were greater than the effects of GPT; technology dimension was more structural and resistant against changes in wage than skill dimension in the manufacturing sector; there was a trade-off between the level of wage and wage inequality and finally, for different percentile groups, technology shocks generated rather varied results.
Although the wage inequality phenomenon has an evergreen debate in economics, its rebirth and salience, after the 1970s, is indebted to the upsurge of wage inequality in the USA. Since then, many efforts have been put to reveal the dynamics behind this increase, and Skill Biased Technical Change turned out to be the epicenter of the discussion. Skill Biased Technical Change or Appropriate Technology alters wages both between skill groups and within skill groups by favoring the labor involved via increased productivity. The main target of this dissertation is to display the effects of hypothetical and implied technology shocks in the form of skill biased technical change and general purpose technology on the Turkish manufacturing sector. Using HLFS data between 2004 and 2015, counterfactual wage distributions were constructed to understand what would have happened if the course of technology changes were different. Our contributions stem from the utilization of the counterfactual method within that framework, the newfangled quantification of skill biased technology by re-parametrization of the DFL method, and application to the Turkish manufacturing sector using micro-level data. The main results can be listed as followings: the effects of SBTC were greater than the effects of GPT; technology dimension was more structural and resistant against changes in wage than skill dimension in the manufacturing sector; there was a trade-off between the level of wage and wage inequality and finally, for different percentile groups, technology shocks generated rather varied results.