题目：Minimum wage and employment – Lessons from doubling the minimum wage
主讲人：Janos Kollo, 匈牙利科学院
主持人：李实，北京师范大学经济与工商管理学院
时间：2015年4月29日（星期三） 19:00-20:30
地点：后主楼1620

内容摘要：
In 2001-2002, within the course of only 13 months, the Hungarian government nearly doubled the minimum wage. The unexpected hike affected more than one-third of the labor force and raised the minimum wage to average wage ratio from 29 to 41 percent. This exceptional intervention provides a unique opportunity to look at the aftermaths of a large minimum wage hike. The seminar will give an overview of Hungarian researchers’ attempts at understanding the implications of the hike for wages, labor costs, employment, firm performance, income inequality and fiscal balance. The reviewed analyses use a wide range of analytical tools ranging from circumspect study of changes in the wage distribution to double hurdle modeling and macro-economic simulation. While some heavily exposed groups were hit hard by the minimum wage hike, its aggregate employment effect was surprisingly weak. In search of an explanation, the seminar will pay particular attention to the question of firm reactions other than employment cuts. It will also point to the biases from tax evasion, which makes the analysis of minimum wage effects difficult in Hungary, similar to other countries with low tax morale. Allowing for these biases suggests that the employment effect must have been more severe than it looked at first sight.