Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/282532 
Year of Publication: 
2023
Series/Report no.: 
CESifo Working Paper No. 10844
Publisher: 
Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo), Munich
Abstract: 
We design, pilot, and field a new survey of occupational skills in Peru, to investigate human capital differences between poor and rich countries. Though the average skill level is comparable, Peruvian jobs have markedly more uniform skill profiles than jobs in the US. However, matching frictions are no more severe than in the US, and recruiting technology is largely equivalent as well. A model with complementarities in production offers a plausible explanation. Uncertainty about labor availability, more pronounced in poor countries' turbulent labor markets, destabilizes production. This generates an endogenous labor demand preference for unspecialized workers.
Subjects: 
cross-country productivity differences
human capital
labor reallocation
JEL: 
E24
O11
O47
Document Type: 
Working Paper
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