Job Search, Matching, and Hiring with Two-Sided Limited Information about Workseekers' Skills
Publication Date
1-1-2018
Grant Type
Early Career Research Award
Description
Firms typically make hiring decisions with limited information about workseekers' skills and productivity. Similarly, workseekers make job search and employment decisions with limited information about their own skills and productivity. These information frictions on both the demand and supply sides of the labor market can distort job search and hiring decisions, lowering employment, earnings, and labor productivity. This project measures the effects of information frictions using two theory-guided randomized experiments in South Africa. Workseekers' skills in six dimensions are directly assessed and workseekers' and firms' access to this information is randomized. Early results suggest that giving firms access to information about workseekers skills substantially increases employment and earnings.
Grant Product
Job Search and Hiring with Two-Sided Limited Information about Workseekers’ Skills
Upjohn Institute Working Paper No. 20-328, 2020
Jobseekers’ Beliefs about Comparative Advantage and (Mis)Directed Search
Upjohn Institute Working Paper No. 23-388, 2023