Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/315005 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Series/Report no.: 
ILO Working Paper No. 136
Publisher: 
International Labour Organization (ILO), Geneva
Abstract: 
We leverage rich data from a prominent online job board in Uruguay to assess directed search patterns in job applications, focusing on posted wages and advertised non-wage amenities. We find robust evidence of directed search based on posted wages in the cross-section, with stark heterogeneity by occupation: the wage-application correlation is driven by vacancies attached to lower-skill occupations, with applications to vacancies attached to higher-skill occupations showing no responsiveness to posted wages. By applying text analysis to the job ads, we elicit advertised non-wage amenities and find evidence of directed search based on non-wage amenities. Applications to vacancies attached to lower-skill occupations are consistent with lexicographic application preferences: amenities predict applications to these vacancies only when wages are not posted. Finally, we exploit industry-by-occupation minimum wage variation to demonstrate that the observed occupational heterogeneity in directed search patterns is supported by quasi-experimental difference-in-differences estimates of the impact of wages on job applications.
Subjects: 
Directed Search
Vacancies
Wages
Non-Wage Amenities
Minimum Wages
JEL: 
E24
J31
J32
J62
J63
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
ISBN: 
978-92-2-041393-7
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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