Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/98221 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2012
Series/Report no.: 
Economic Growth Center Discussion Paper No. 1016
Publisher: 
Yale University, Economic Growth Center, New Haven, CT
Abstract: 
Unskilled labor is the abundant resource in many developing countries, especially at an early stage of their development. Yet, even as at given technologies labor markets have not cleared, neo-classical economists have rejected the notion of an institutional or bargaining wage not based on competitive full employment marginal productivity fundamentals. This paper puts to rest some objections to labor surplus theory based on red herrings and then addresses the substantive challenges from the micro-econometric branch of neo-classical economics. We contend that the finding of inelastic supply curves of labor is based on a cross-section static analysis of labor supply within agriculture while the labor surplus model deals with tracing the dynamic reallocation of labor from a traditional to a neo-classical organized sector in a dualistic economy. We present data for a number of labor surplus developing countries showing that institutional wages lag behind agricultural productivity increases as countries move towards a turning point when inter-sectoral balanced growth has eliminated unskilled labor and the economy has lost its dual characteristic.
Subjects: 
development
labor surplus
neo-classical economics
turning point labor markets
development
labor surplus
neo-classical economics
turning point labor markets
JEL: 
O10
O11
O17
O18
O41
O43
O57
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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