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Job Polarization and Jobless Recoveries

Jaimovich, Siu

2012NBER Working Paper226 citations

Observational labor market

Automation / RobotsRoutine task changeGeneral automation

Abstract

Job polarization refers to the shrinking share of employment in middle-skill, routine occupations experienced recently, over the last 35 years.Jobless recoveries refers to the slow rebound in aggregate employment following recent recessions, despite recoveries in aggregate output.We show how these two phenomena are related.First, essentially all employment loss in routine occupations occurs in economic downturns.Second, jobless recoveries in the aggregate can be accounted for by jobless recoveries in the routine occupations that are disappearing.

Summary

Jaimovich and Siu use CPS employment data and business cycle decomposition to show that job polarization (the disappearance of routine middle-skill occupations) occurs primarily during recessions and accounts for jobless recoveries in the US since 1991

Main Finding

88% of routine occupation job loss from 1990-2017 occurred within 12-month windows of NBER recessions; routine occupations account for 91% of recessionary job loss but show no recovery, fully explaining aggregate jobless recoveries in 1991, 2001, and 2009

Primary Datasets

CPS

Labor outcomes

CPS, Census

Secondary Datasets

BLS productivity

Key Methods: Business cycle decomposition comparing routine vs non-routine occupations across early (1970-1982) and recent (1991-2009) recessions; counterfactual exercises
Sample Period: 1967-2017
Geographic Coverage: US
Sample Size: Monthly employment data for all civilian non-institutionalized individuals aged 16+; routine occupations ~50% of total employment in study period
Level of Analysis: Occupation, Country, Region
Occupation Classification: Census consistent
Industry Classification: N/A
Replication Package: Yes

Notes

Links polarization to recoveries [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence. [Claude classification]: Classic paper linking job polarization to jobless recoveries. Studies routine-biased technological change (pre-LLM automation). Uses band-pass filtering and counterfactual exercises but makes no formal causal claims. Supplemented with state-level and international evidence.