The Cycle of Earnings Inequality: Evidence from Spanish Social Security Data

By S. Bonhomme, Laura Hospido. Social Science Research Network, 2017

161 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We use detailed information on labor earnings and employment from social security records to document the evolution of earnings inequality in Spain from 1988 to 2010. Male earnings inequality was strongly countercyclical: it increased around the 1993 recession, showed a substantial decrease during the 1997-2007 expansion, and then a sharp increase during the recent recession. This evolution was partly driven by the cyclicality of employment and earnings in the lower-middle part of the distribution. We emphasize the importance of the housing boom and subsequent housing bust, and show that demand shocks in the construction sector had large effects on aggregate labor market outcomes.

Subfields: Demography, Economics and Econometrics, General Health Professions

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9758e8f0b6983d666808a143b0d6a73cf5335cbc

Citations in the corpus

• CENTRAL BANK POLICIES AND INCOME AND WEALTH INEQUALITY: A SURVEY (2019, unknown): “For instance, Bonhomme and Hospido (2017) find that earnings inequality in Spain over 1988–2010 was strongly countercyclical; this evolution is partly explained by fluctuations in employment composition, construction sector, and housing market.”