Job change patterns and the wages of young men

This study uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to distinguish empirically between mover-stayer, "search good," in and which "experience the pattern good" of overall models job of mobility job mobility. affects We both estimate the level wage and models tenure slope of the log-wage path. After controlling for the correlation between mobility patterns and time-constant person-and job-specific unobservables, we find that workers who undergo persistent mobility have lower log-wage paths than less mobile workers. This finding is consistent with models in which job mobility is driven by time-varying unobservables, such as "experience good" models, where changes in perceived match quality cause turnover.