Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics

Working Paper Series,
IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy

No 2021:18: Firm productivity and immigrant-native earnings disparity

Olof Åslund (), Cristina Bratu, Stefano Lombardi and Anna Thoresson ()
Additional contact information
Olof Åslund: IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, Postal: Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, P O Box 513, SE-751 20 Uppsala, Sweden
Cristina Bratu: Aalto University, Postal: Aalto University
Stefano Lombardi: VATT Institute for Economic Research, Postal: VATT Institute for Economic Research (Helsinki),
Anna Thoresson: IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, Postal: Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, P O Box 513, SE-751 20 Uppsala, Sweden

Abstract: We study the role of firm productivity in explaining earnings disparities between immigrants and natives using population-wide matched employer-employee data from Sweden. We find substantial earnings returns to working in firms with higher persistent productivity, with greater gains for immigrants from non-Western countries. Moreover, the pass-through of within-firm productivity variation to earnings is stronger for immigrants in low-productive, immigrant-dense firms. But immigrant workers are underrepresented in high-productive firms and less likely to move up the productivity distribution. Thus, sorting into less productive firms decreases earnings in poor-performing immigrant groups that would gain the most from working in high-productive firms.

Keywords: Firm productivity; Immigrant-native earnings gaps; Wage inequality

JEL-codes: J15; J31; J62

Language: English

38 pages, December 8, 2021

Full text files

wp-2021-18-firm-prod...rnings-disparity.pdf PDF-file Full text

Download statistics

Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Ali Ghooloo ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ().

RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2021_018This page generated on 2024-09-13 22:15:20.