Research

Current Projects

On the Industry Specificity of Human Capital and Business Cycles (joint with Sergey Slobodyan and Evangelia Vourvachaki)

Abstract

We define specific (general) human capital as the set of occupations whose use is spread in a limited (wide) set of industries. Using the EU Labor Force Survey database, we identify these human capital types and analyze their employment and education. This exercise yields a persistent assignment of occupations into specific and general human capital types. The share of specific human capital varies across countries and has declined over time almost everywhere.

We consider a stylized two-sector model where one of the sectors uses both types of human capital and the other specializes in general human capital.  We show that a mean preserving increase in the share of specific human capital reduces (increases) the contribution of shocks in non-specialized sector and increases (reduces) the contribution of shocks in the specialized sector to the variance of the final output when sectoral outputs are gross complements (substitutes).

The current draft can be found here

The working paper version can be found here

An early draft can be found here (previously circulated as “Specific and General Types of Human Capital”)

Working from Home in European Countries Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic (joint with Montserrat Vilalta-Bufí)

We use data from the EU Labour Force Survey for 8 countries and document the levels of working from home in the sample countries, industries, and occupations in the 2011-2019 period and its changes in 2020, the year when the COVID-19 pandemic started. We show that there are significant differences in working from home across countries, industries, and occupations and that working from home has increased almost everywhere in the 2011-2019 period and more significantly in 2020. Countries that had the lowest levels of working from home in 2019 enacted the most stringent stay-home and workplace closure policies and experienced the largest growth rates in working from home in 2020. Finally, we compute a measure of working from home capacity for the sample countries using the observed working from home levels.

The working paper version can be found here

On the Elasticity of Substitution between Labor and ICT and IP Capital and Traditional Capital

I estimate CES aggregate production functions for the US, the UK, Japan, Germany, and Spain using data from the EU KLEMS database. I distinguish between three types of capital: information and communication technologies (ICT), intellectual property (IP) capital, and traditional capital. I assume that the aggregate output is produced using labor and these three types of capital and allow for differences in the elasticities of substitution between labor, an aggregate of ICT and IP capital, and traditional capital. The estimated elasticities of substitution between ICT and IP capital are strictly below one for all sample countries implying gross-complementarity. ICT and IP capital together are gross-substitutes for labor while traditional capital is a gross-complement.

The current version can be found here

Demographic Transition, Aggregate Productivity Growth Slowdown, and Structural Change (joint with Wilma Ticona-Huanca)

We derive an OLG model to study the effect of demographic transition and aggregate productivity growth slowdown on structural changes in employment in agriculture in European countries. The demographic transition in the model is associated with a significant fall in mortality probabilities, especially in old age, a fall in population growth, and a fall in labor productivity. Overall, together with the productivity growth slowdown, it implies an increase in the savings rate and a fall in the interest rate. The higher savings and investments directly affect the employment share in agriculture because the agricultural sector has higher capital intensity and capital-labor substitutability than the rest of the economy. We show that the demographic transition alone can account for 15 percent of the observed fall in agricultural employment in the 1970-2020 period. Together with the TFP growth slowdown, it can account for about 40 percent of the observed fall in agricultural employment.

A very early draft is available here

Automation by Employees

I derive a model where employees allocate their time to solving abstract and routine tasks and create routines to solve routine tasks. They generate output by solving these tasks. The employees have tacit knowledge about productive routine tasks, how to automate them, and the time it takes to perform them. They also have heterogeneous skills in performing abstract and routine tasks. In turn, managers allocate their time to solve the abstract tasks that weren’t solved by the employees and to managerial tasks. I analyze employees’ time allocations and motives to automate, and how these affect time allocations of managers and firm growth. Finally, I consider an environment where time allocations of employees and managers are set jointly. I study the distortions created by the employees’ tacit knowledge about routine tasks and their effect on time allocations and firm growth.

Draft coming soon

Life-Long Learning in an OLG Model with Altruism (joint with Fernando Sánchez-Losada)

Draft coming soon

Why do Young Europeans Work Less than Young Americans? Hours, Family Formation, and Labor Market Regulations (joint with Marc Teignier Baqué)

Draft coming soon

Publications and Forthcoming Papers

  • Jerbashian, V. and M. Vilalta-Bufí (2023). On Working from Home in European Countries. Forthcoming in International Journal of Manpower.
  • Brotherhood, L. and V. Jerbashian (2023). Firm Behavior during an Epidemic. Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control. Available online here
  • Jerbashian, V. (2021). Intellectual Property and Product Market Competition Regulations in a Model with two R&D Performing Sectors. Macroeconomic Dynamics 25(1), 59-80. Available online here
  • Jerbashian, V. (2021). Trade in Information Technologies and Changes in the Demand for Occupations. China Economic Review 67, 1-14. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. (2019). Automation and Job Polarization: On the Decline of Middling Occupations in Europe. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics 81(5), 1095-1116. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. and A. Kochanova (2018). Tele-Communications 2.0: The Age of the Internet. B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy 18(3), 1-8. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. and A. Kochanova (2017). The Impact of Telecommunication Technologies on Competition in Services and Goods Markets: Empirical evidence. Scandinavian Journal of Economics 119(3), 628-655. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. (2016). Knowledge Licensing in a Model of R&D-driven Endogenous Growth. B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics 16(2), 555–579. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. and A. Kochanova (2016). The Impact of Doing Business Regulations on Investments in ICT. Empirical Economics 50(3), 991-1008. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V. (2015). Telecommunications Industry and Economic Growth: How its Market Structure Matters. Economic Modelling 51, 515–523. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, V., S. Slobodyan, and E. Vourvachaki (2015). Specific and General Human Capital in an Endogenous Growth Model. Eastern European Economics 53(3), 167-204. Available in print here
  • Jerbashian, A. and V. Jerbashian (2007). Functions of ω-Bounded Type in the Half-Plane. Computational Methods and Function Theory 7(1), 205-238. Available in print here