For your term paper, you will argue for a decision related to labor economics. That decision can be one that is made by a government, an employer, or an individual.  If the decision- maker is the government, you should be arguing that the decision is best for society; if the decisionmaker is an employer or individual, you should be arguing that the decision is best for that employer or individual, regardless of consequences for others. Your argument may be broad (for example, “all governments should do X”) or narrow (for example, “companies facing Y conditions should do Z”).

A large part of your paper will be a literature review of two articles published in the last 10 years in the Journal of Labor Economics or the Journal of Human Resources.   Therefore, I recommend that you start by browsing the last 10 years of those journals using the links in the footnotes, finding a couple of related articles that look interesting to you, and then crafting an argument around them.

Your paper should consist of four clearly-labeled sections, with point values as follows; I sug- gest making the length roughly proportional to the point totals. Within each of the sections, you will be graded according to whether your response is well-argued and successfully ad- dresses the issues at hand. For the literature review and data analysis section, you will also be graded according to whether you have chosen appropriate articles to review or analyses to run.

1. Introduction (5 points)

2. Literature review (40 points; 20 points per article)

3. Data analysis (25 points)

4. Synthesis (20 points)

Additionally, 10 points of your grade will be based on grammar and style. For this portion of your grade, the grader will look at the paper as a whole. Some questions the grader might be considering:  Are there many grammar mistakes that make the paper difficult to read? Are sentences written clearly and concisely? Is the paper organized in a way that helps the reader understand the points being made? Note that, if your paper has many grammatical or stylistic problems, it may also negatively affect other portions of your grade because the grader will not be able to understand your arguments. If you need help with your writing, I strongly suggest that you make an appointment with the Academic Skills Centre, which offers online appointments.

2. Literature review

Your paper must include a discussion of two articles in scholarly journals.  To get an A on this section, your technical knowledge does not need to surpass the level assumed in the lectures.  Instead, you do need to demonstrate that you can apply your understanding creatively, and that you have carefully read the journal articles you cite. You should assume that your audience is a smart undergraduate economics major who has taken this class, but has not read the article you cite, is not an expert in that area, and may not have taken other advanced economics courses.

The articles you choose must have been published in the last 10 years in either the Journal of Labor Economics or the Journal of Human Resources. These articles should be carefully chosen to make sure you are able to understand them and that they help you make your argument.  (Note that you may choose an article that seems to support a position you are arguing against; in that case, you will need to explain why your position is still valid despite the evidence from the article.)  Finding appropriate articles may be a difficult and time- consuming process; I recommend you begin early. Part of the goal of this exercise is to give you experience in finding useful scholarly articles, but that can be a difficult task. Once you have identified a article that looks promising, you should be able to download it from the library.

For each article, your review will consist of three parts.

1. Briefly summarize the article. What are the primary findings, and how does the article arrive at them? If the article is empirical, what data does it use?

2. How do these findings relate to economic theory you have learned in this class or other classes?  How, if at all, should the theories we’ve learned be changed or extended to account for these findings? Do you have any criticisms of this article?

3. Why are the results from this article important to think about in making the decision you are discussing in your paper?

I am available in office hours to answer any questions you might have in understanding the articles and interpreting the language, which may be more technical than you are used to. Note that you do not need to understand every technical detail in the articles you choose; however, you should have a good understanding of what the results are and how the author(s) came to them.

3. Data analysis

Your analysis must include at least one empirical fact that you have found with a new analysis of economic data. (By “fact,” I mean a regression result, average of a subgroup, or something similar.) The analysis may be chosen either to help motivate the importance of your research topic or to help persuade the reader of your conclusion. Your analysis should not be more advanced than the methods discussed in class; you will be graded on the extent to which you can use the tools we’ve discussed to advance an argument.

In future weeks, we will discuss how to use one great resource for economic data: https: //www.ipums.org/.  You may use data from IPUMS, or from any other reputable source.

(If you aren’t sure if the source is reputable, come to office hours to discuss.)

Your data analysis section will consist of three parts:

1. Briefly describe your data. That should include:

❼ Cite the source of the data.

❼ State the country/region it is from.

❼ State what year(s) it was gathered.

❼ State what a unit of observation is (that is, is one observation a person, a province,

etc?).

❼ State what each key variable means.

2. Present the analysis, describing the fact(s) you have found.  This should not include analysis of the importance of the fact(s); instead, simply explain what the fact is. This part may include a table or figure if you wish. However, note that tables and figures do not count toward the page total.

3. Discuss the importance of the fact(s) you have found. Why do you think your findings motivate the importance of your analysis or persuade the reader of your conclusion? For example, if you present a regression result, you should explain what that result suggests; if there are alternative explanations for that result, you should explain them, too.

At the end of the paper–in an appendix–you will include the .do file and .log file you used to analyze the data.

4.  Synthesis

In this section, you will combine the evidence from your literature review and data analysis to make your argument. If you wish, you may also cite other sources, including other scholarly journal articles or newspaper articles, though you do not need to do so.  Taking all the evidence together, why should the reader believe your argument?