Excessive labor turnover may be considered, to a great extent, an
undesirable feature of a given economy. This follows from considerations
such as underinvestment in human capital by firms. Understanding the
determinants and the evolution of turnover in a particular labor market is
therefore of paramount importance, including policy consider- ations. The
present paper proposes an econometric analysis of turnover in the Brazilian
labor market, based on a partial observability bivariate probit model. This
model consid- ers the interdependence of decisions taken by workers and
firms, helping to elucidate the causes that lead each of them to end an
employment relationship. The Employment and Unemployment Survey (PED)
conducted by the State System of Data Analysis (SEADE) and by the
Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies (DIEESE)
provides data at the individual worker level, allowing for the estimation of
the joint prob- abilities of decisions to quit or stay on the job on the
worker’s side, and to maintain or fire the employee on the firm’s side,
during a given time period. The estimated param- eters relate these
estimated probabilities to the characteristics of workers, job contracts,
and to the potential macroeconomic determinants in different time periods.
The results confirm the theoretical prediction that the probability of
termination of an employment relationship tends to be smaller as the worker
acquires specific skills. The results also show that the establishment of a
formal employment relationship reduces the probabil- ity of a quit decision
by the worker, and also the firm’s firing decision in non-industrial
sectors. With regard to the evolution of quit probability over time, the
results show that an increase in the unemployment rate inhibits quitting,
although this tends to wane as the unemployment rate rises.
Determinants of Child Labour in Cameroon: A Bivariate Probit Model Analysis
