Full Citation

Title: Obsolescence Rents: Teamsters, Truckers, and Impending Innovations

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2022

ISBN:

ISSN:

DOI:

NSFID:

PMCID:

PMID:

Abstract: We consider large, permanent shocks to individual occupations whose arrival date is uncertain. We are motivated by the advent of self-driving trucks, which will reduce demand for truck drivers dramatically. Using a bare-bones overlapping generations model, we examine an occupation facing a risk of obsolescence. We show that workers must be compensated to enter the occupation - receiving what we dub "obsolescence rents" - while employment in the occupation falls and becomes older. We investigate the market for teamsters at the dawn of the automotive truck as an 'a propos parallel to truckers themselves, as self-driving trucks crest the horizon. We find that as widespread adoption of trucks drew nearer, the number of teamsters fell, the occupation became 'grayer,' and teamster wages rose, as predicted by the model.

Url: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/ccavounidis/obsolescence_rents.pdf

User Submitted?: No

Authors: Cavounidis, Costas; Chai, Qingyuan; Lang, Kevin; Malhotra, Raghav

Publisher:

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Labor Force and Occupational Structure, Methodology and Data Collection

Countries: