LawrenceKahn

Lawrence Kahn

The Braunstein Family Professor, Professor of Economics, Cornell University
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About Lawrence

Kahn's research interests include international differences in labor market institutions and labor market outcomes such as wage inequality, unemployment, and the gender pay gap. In addition, he has had a long term interest in sports labor markets and is currently also conducting research on immigration and the labor market.

Kahn is a Research Fellow of the Center for Economic Studies/Ifo Institute for Economic Research in Munich, Germany, of the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn, Germany, and of the National Centre for Econometric Research in Australia (Sportometrics Program). He was Chair of the Labor Economics Department at Cornell during 1998-99 and 2000-2005, is Editor of the Industrial & Labor Relations Review, is on the editorial board of the Journal of Sports Economics, served as Associate Editor of the Industrial & Labor Relations Review and Specialized Co-Editor (for Sports Economics) of Economic Inquiry and was on the Board of Editors of Industrial Relations. Before joining the Cornell faculty in 1994, he was a Professor of Economics and Labor and Industrial Relations at the University of Illinois. He has served as Visiting Fellow in the Economics Department of Princeton University, Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation in New York, Visiting Scholar at the Academia Sinica in Taipei, Visiting Scholar at the Office of Labour Market Policy Evaluation in Uppsala, Sweden, and Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University. He has also served as a member of the National Academy Sciences Committee on Women's Employment and Related Social Issues.

Contributions

Why Do American Women Continue to Earn Less than Men?

  • Francine Blau

In the News

Lawrence Kahn quoted by Liz Kennedy and Vikram Singh, "Drivers of Authoritarian Populism in the United States" Center for American Progress, May 10, 2018.
"Analysis: Why Women Continue to Make Less Than Men," Lawrence Kahn (with Francine Blau), PBS News Hour, September 29, 2017.

Publications

"At Home and Abroad: US Labor Market Performance in International Perspective" (with Francine Blau) (Russell Sage Foundation, 2002).

Discusses the relationship between different economic responses and outcomes

"Is There Still Son Preference in the United States?," (with Francine Blau), The National Bureau of Economic Research, September 1, 2017.

Uses 2008-2013 American Community Survey data to update and further probe Dahl and Morettiā€™s (2008) son preference results, which found evidence that having a female first child increased the probability of single female headship and raised fertility.

"The Gender Wage Gap: Extent, Trends, and Sources" (with Francine Blau). Journal of Economic Literature 55, no. 3 (2017): 789-865.

Provides new empirical evidence on the extent of and trends in the gender wage gap, which declined considerably over the period between 1980 and 2010.

"Chapter 15: Immigration and the Distribution of Incomes" (with Francine Blau), in Handbook of the Economics of International Migration, edited by Barry R. Chiswick, Paul W. Miller (Elsevier B.V., 2015), 793-843.

review research on the impact of immigration on income distribution, surveying studies from a variety of countries. Immigration may affect the skill composition of a country's residents and also, by changing relative factor supplies, its relative factor prices. 

"The Economics of Discrimination: Evidence from Basketball" in Oxford Handbook of Sports Economics: Economics Through Sports (Oxford University Press, 2012).
"At Home and Abroad: US Labor Market Performance in International Perspective" (with Francine Blau) (Russell Sage Foundation, 2002).
"Gender Differences in Pay" (with Francine Blau). American Economic Association 14, no. 4 (2000): 75-99.

 Considers the gender pay gap in the United States. Both gender-specific factors, including gender differences in qualifications and discrimination, and overall wage structure, the rewards for skills and employment in particular sectors, importantly influence the gender pay gap.