Vacancy Durations and Entry Wages: Evidence from Linked Vacancy-Employer-Employee Data

Abstract

This paper explores the relationship between the duration of a vacancy and the starting wage of a new job, using unusually informative data comprising detailed information on vacancies, the establishments posting the vacancies, and the workers eventually filling the vacancies. We find that vacancy durations are negatively correlated with the starting wage and that this negative association is particularly strong with the establishment component of the starting wage. We also confirm previous findings that growing establishments fill their vacancies faster. To understand the relationship between establishment growth, vacancy filling and entry wages, we calibrate a model with directed search and ex-ante heterogeneous workers and firms. We find a strong tension between matching the sharp increase in vacancy filling for growing firms and the response of vacancy filling to firm-level wages. We discuss the implications of this finding as well as potential resolutions.

Hiring Frictions in a Regulated Occupation: Evidence from US Laboratories

“…It is optimal for firms to spend more screening effort (and hence more time) for high-productivity positions (Barron et al 1997). Consistent with this result, the empirical evidence shows that higher-wage positions take longer to fill (Faberman and Menzio 2018;Kettemann et al 2018). Nevertheless, despite these caveats, if skills are strong predictors of intensive-margin changes, then a reader might be concerned that this study's focus on the extensive margin masks the role of skill requirements.…”

How Broadband Internet Affects Labor Market Matching

“…Davis et al (2013) examine time-varying and cross-sectional variation in vacancy filling rates and argue that higher employment growth is explained by more intense recruiting. To the best of our knowledge, Kettemann et al (2018) is the only other study that combines administrative data on vacancies, firms, and workers. Their main finding is that high-paying firms fill their vacancies faster.…”

Vacancies, Employment Outcomes and Firm Growth: Evidence from Denmark

“…This greatly expands the available information on posting (and non-posting) firms and the workers that flow between the firms. Examples include Kettemann, Mueller, and Zweimüller (2018), who link vacancy data from the Austrian AMS vacancy data (a search-method based public employment agency dataset) to social security records, and Carrillo-Tudela, Gartner, and Kaas, 2020, who link the German JVS (an establishment survey) to administrative employment histories of workers.…”

“…As described above, we link this vacancy data to Danish matched employer-employee data. Compared to Kettemann, Mueller, and Zweimüller (2018) and Carrillo-Tudela, Gartner, and Kaas (2020), our data is particularly rich on information on the posting firms, including quarterly value added and revenue observations, as well as containing detailed labor market histories of workers. This allows us to conduct a comprehensive firm-level evaluation of vacancy posting, employment outcomes and growth and answer questions that has hitherto eluded the literature.…”

“…Our paper is also related to empirical work on vacancies using online job board data (Marinescu and Wolthoff (2020), Davis and Samaniego de la Parra (2017), Modestino, Shoag, and Ballance (2019), Hershbein and Kahn (2018) and Banfi and Villena-Roldan (2019) among others) and more recent papers that match vacancy data with the administrative matched employer-employee data (e.g. Carrillo-Tudela, Gartner, and Kaas (2020) and Kettemann, Mueller, and Zweimüller (2018)).…”