Research & Action Report Fall/Winter 2013

Sari Pekkala Kerr, Ph.D., senior research scientist and economist at WCW visited the Research Institute of the Finnish Economy (ETLA) in Helsinki in September 2013. While there, she worked on the “Job Polarization and Wage Inequality” project, where the research team evaluated how job polarization in Finland has taken place within and across firms, and how this relates to the firms’ outsourcing and export decisions, as well as changes in their research and development investments and information and communications technology usage. Job polarization—or erosion of mid-level jobs—is occurring in practically all industrialized countries, and is causing a widening of income disparities. The Finnish data uniquely allow the researchers to conduct a deep analysis of the phenomenon at the firm level and understand the mechanisms driving job polarization. The project is funded by the Academy of Finland. While working in Finland, Kerr presented “Immigration and Employer Transitions for STEM Workers,” with William Kerr, Ph.D. at the Jyväskylä University School of Business and Economics Seminar.