What happens to the piece rate if there is a ratchet effect?
A. The piece rate decreases over time.
B. The piece rate increases over time.
C. The piece rate is replaced with a time rate.
D. The piece rate is replaced with a salary contract.
E. The piece rate is only paid to the least productive workers.
In the United States, the federal minimum wage is legislated in nominal terms. This
means that
A. the federal minimum wage is indexed for inflation.
B. the federal minimum wage historically decreases in value during stretches when the
minimum wage is not increased.
C. employers do not have to pay payroll taxes on wages paid to minimum wage
workers.
D. unemployed workers collect government assistance equal to the minimum wage.
E. the government pays the minimum wage to all local, state, and federal workers.
What is an example of general job training?
A. Learning how to use a forklift.
B. Learning how to weld.
C. Reading a book on techniques for managing large groups of workers involved on
team projects.
D. Attending an industry convention on “best practices.”
E. All of the above.
People decide how much schooling to receive based on:
A. Their discount rate.
B. The marginal rate of return to schooling.
C. The present value of expected future earnings.
D. Their ability to succeed in education programs.
E. All of the above factors influence how much schooling one receives.
Labor unions in the United States today
A. are as influential as they were in the 1950s.
B. cover the same percent of workers as they did in years past.
C. are much more popular among immigrant workers than among native workers.
D. look to protect the interests of the employers of labor.
E. tend to be less influential compared to labor unions in other developed countries.
In the United States over the last 30 years, wage differentials have
A. narrowed for all groups of workers.
B. increased for all groups of workers.
C. increased for skilled workers but have narrowed for unskilled workers.
D. decreased for skilled workers but have increased for unskilled workers.
E. increased for women but have narrowed for men.
Approximately what percent of people in the United States typically do not graduate
from high school?
A. 2%
B. 5%
C. 10%
D. 15%
E. 20%
Discrimination in the workforce
A. leads to inefficiency.
B. never leads to higher utility.
C. empirically does not exist.
D. empirically is due primarily to employees and not employers or consumers.
E. empirically is due primarily to consumers and not employers or employees.
A monopsonist is
A. a firm with partial control over an industry.
B. a firm operating in a regulated industry.
C. a firm that is the single purchaser of a factor of production.
D. a firm that competes for labor but sells its output in a non-competitive market.
E. a group of firms, much like a cartel, that restricts the demand for labor in a market.
One possible measure of gender discrimination is to look at the difference between the
average male wage and the average female wage. This is a poor measure of
discrimination for all of the following reasons except:
A. Men and women might have different preferences when it comes to supplying labor.
B. Men and women may differ in the return they receive for their skills.
C. Men and women may differ in their overall level of skill.
D. Men and women may differ in their taste for part-time jobs.
E. Men and women may differ in their willingness to accept risky jobs.
In part labor economics concerns:
A. How labor markets work.
B. The study of education decisions.
C. The study of how households decide where to live.
D. The study of income inequality.
E. All of the above.
Yellow-dog contracts
A. give workers the right to be represented by a union.
B. give a non-union worker the right to enjoy union benefits without paying union dues.
C. give firms the right to hire replacement labor when the union strikes.
D. give firms the right to require a worker to not join a union as a condition of
employment.
E. give the firm the right to permanently fire anyone who strikes.
A firms demand for labor is derived in part from
A. government policy.
B. consumer demand for the firms product.
C. unionized workers.
D. the firms sunk costs.
E. the value of the firms stock price.
The bonding critique criticizes the model of efficiency wages because
A. profit-maximizing firms should never be willing to pay more than the competitive
wage.
B. workers should be willing to give the firm collateral that the firm would keep if the
firm ever caught the worker shirking, and in exchange the worker would be willing to
work for a wage less than the efficiency wage.
C. firms cannot issue bonds to pay for labor costs.
D. workers do not know how well the firm can monitor worker effort.
E. worker effort is unrelated to wages.
Which of the following is not a leading actor in labor markets?
A. Consumers
B. Firms
C. Workers
D. Government
E. Unions
Which of the following is least associated with union jobs and contracts?
A. High-skilled workers.
B. A large population of black workers.
C. A large population of immigrant workers.
D. Both private and public sectors jobs.
E. Jobs in industries that are controlled by just a few firms.
Suppose an economy exhibits general conditions of downward sloping labor demand,
upward sloping supplies of domestic and immigrant labor, and a competitive labor
market. Which of the following is not a likely outcome of immigration?
A. Domestic workers will experience some job losses.
B. Domestic workers who keep their job will experience an increase in earnings.
C. The market clearing wage will fall.
D. Economic surplus will increase in the destination country, even net of immigrant
earnings.
E. Some economic surplus will transfer from domestic workers to domestic firms.
James is currently unemployed. He is disappointed every Sunday when none of the job
advertisements in the newspaper are for workers with his particular skill set. What type
of unemployment is James experiencing?
A. Frictional unemployment
B. Seasonal unemployment
C. Cyclical unemployment
D. Structural unemployment
E. Natural unemployment
Which is not a factor that generates return and/or repeat migration flows?
A. A worker realizes after the move that he or she miscalculated labor market
opportunities in the new location.
B. A worker realizes after the move that he or she does not like the weather in the new
location.
C. A worker moved initially in order to move up the career ladder in his or her
company.
D. A worker lands a job after the move that pays him or her a wage much greater than
originally expected.
E. A worker realizes after the move that the monetary and psychic costs of moving are
not as large as he or she originally calculated.