TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Gobillon, Laurent
AU  - Magnac, Thierry
AU  - Roux, Sébastien
        TI  - Lifecycle Wages and Human Capital Investments: Selection and Missing Data
        PY  - 2025/Apr/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 17838
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp17838
        AB  - We derive wage equations with individual specific coefficients from a structural model of human capital investment over the life cycle. This model allows for interruptions in labour market participation and deals with missing data and attrition problems. We propose a new framework that deals with missingness at random and is based on factor decompositions that allow for flexible control of selection. Our approach leads to an interactive effect wage specification, which we estimate using long administrative panel data on male wages in the private sector in France. A structural function approach shows that interruptions negatively affect average wages. Interestingly, they also negatively affect the inter-decile range of wages after twenty years. This is only partly due to the fact that interruptions are endogenous.
        KW  - human capital investment
KW  - wage inequalities
KW  - factor models
KW  - missing data
        ER  -