Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia
Agglomeration boosts economic growth. A vast literature has empirically assessed the effects of agglomeration by estimating the city population elasticity on wages. This conventional approach is not necessarily suitable for analyzing urbanization a...
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World Bank, Washington, DC
2020
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/800691584111128907/Urban-Agglomerations-and-Employment-Transitions-in-Ethiopia http://hdl.handle.net/10986/33444 |
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okr-10986-334442022-09-20T00:13:49Z Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia Kamei, Akito Nakamura, Shohei URBANIZATION LABOR MARKET URBAN AGGLOMERATION SPATIAL ECONOMICS INFORMALITY SELF-EMPLOYMENT WAGE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP Agglomeration boosts economic growth. A vast literature has empirically assessed the effects of agglomeration by estimating the city population elasticity on wages. This conventional approach is not necessarily suitable for analyzing urbanization at the early stage in developing countries, where a majority of urban workers engage in self-employment and/or informal jobs. Focusing on one of the poorest and largest among those countries, this paper sheds light on an aspect of urbanization and agglomeration: the transition in the mode of labor from self-employment/informal jobs to wage employment/formal jobs. Applying the instrumental variable approach to national labor force survey data sets, the analysis underscores several labor market transitions across space in urban Ethiopia. First, the town population size and the share of workers with wage employment are strongly correlated. The probability of engaging in wage work increases by 4.5 percentage points with a log increase in population size. Second, this relationship is particularly strong among disadvantaged workers, such as the female, young, and/or less educated population. Finally, the study documents higher labor force participation and lower underemployment in larger towns. 2020-03-19T17:37:22Z 2020-03-19T17:37:22Z 2020-03 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/800691584111128907/Urban-Agglomerations-and-Employment-Transitions-in-Ethiopia http://hdl.handle.net/10986/33444 English Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9184 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper Africa Ethiopia |
| repository_type |
Digital Repository |
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Foreign Institution |
| institution |
Digital Repositories |
| building |
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository |
| collection |
World Bank |
| language |
English |
| topic |
URBANIZATION LABOR MARKET URBAN AGGLOMERATION SPATIAL ECONOMICS INFORMALITY SELF-EMPLOYMENT WAGE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP |
| spellingShingle |
URBANIZATION LABOR MARKET URBAN AGGLOMERATION SPATIAL ECONOMICS INFORMALITY SELF-EMPLOYMENT WAGE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP Kamei, Akito Nakamura, Shohei Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| geographic_facet |
Africa Ethiopia |
| relation |
Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9184 |
| description |
Agglomeration boosts economic growth. A
vast literature has empirically assessed the effects of
agglomeration by estimating the city population elasticity
on wages. This conventional approach is not necessarily
suitable for analyzing urbanization at the early stage in
developing countries, where a majority of urban workers
engage in self-employment and/or informal jobs. Focusing on
one of the poorest and largest among those countries, this
paper sheds light on an aspect of urbanization and
agglomeration: the transition in the mode of labor from
self-employment/informal jobs to wage employment/formal
jobs. Applying the instrumental variable approach to
national labor force survey data sets, the analysis
underscores several labor market transitions across space in
urban Ethiopia. First, the town population size and the
share of workers with wage employment are strongly
correlated. The probability of engaging in wage work
increases by 4.5 percentage points with a log increase in
population size. Second, this relationship is particularly
strong among disadvantaged workers, such as the female,
young, and/or less educated population. Finally, the study
documents higher labor force participation and lower
underemployment in larger towns. |
| format |
Working Paper |
| author |
Kamei, Akito Nakamura, Shohei |
| author_facet |
Kamei, Akito Nakamura, Shohei |
| author_sort |
Kamei, Akito |
| title |
Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| title_short |
Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| title_full |
Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| title_fullStr |
Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Urban Agglomerations and Employment Transitions in Ethiopia |
| title_sort |
urban agglomerations and employment transitions in ethiopia |
| publisher |
World Bank, Washington, DC |
| publishDate |
2020 |
| url |
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/800691584111128907/Urban-Agglomerations-and-Employment-Transitions-in-Ethiopia http://hdl.handle.net/10986/33444 |
| _version_ |
1764478776970838016 |