SIRE Chair in Economics
- About
-
- Email Address
- kabender@abdn.ac.uk
- Telephone Number
- +44 (0)1224 273411
- Office Address
- School/Department
- Business School
Biography
I specialise in applied microeconomics, particularly interested in labour economics. Early in my career I focused on the role of institutions and labour market outcomes, looking at differences between union and nonunion workers, public and private sector workers, and the subjective wellbeing of retirees and retirement behaviour. More recently I have been looking at the interactions of health and labour economics, particularly the effect of different kinds of labour contracts on stress and the health of workers. In addition, I have previously done research on issues around in the educational and skills mismatch in the labour market, examining its incidence, causes and effects, particularly among the very highly educated.
I am an Associate Editor of the British Journal of Industrial Relations and a Research Fellow of the IZA.
In addition to working at the Unversity of Aberdeen, I have held previous positions at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the US Social Security Administration, as well as visiting positions at Louisiana State University, University of Potsdam, Giessen University and the National Institute for Labour Studies at Flinders University in Australia.
Performance Related Pay and Health
Research in economics have established a link between performance-related pay (PRP) – where workers’ pay is contingent upon their performance at work – and poor health. However, the causal direction of this relationship is not known. The aim of the project is to explore this relationship using an experimental work task and by measuring stress through cortisol. This paradigm will then be altered to measure other effects that may influence the relationship between PRP and stress.
Qualifications
- PhD Economics1994 - Duke University
- MA Economics1992 - Duke University
- BA Economics1990 - Furman University
Memberships and Affiliations
- Internal Memberships
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Director of Research - Business School
Member of the Centre for Labour Market Research (CeLMR), the Scottish Experimental Economics Laboratory (SEEL) and the Just Transition Lab (JTL).
- External Memberships
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Nonexecutive Board Member of the Keith and Strathisla Regional Partnership (InKeith).
- Research
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Research Overview
Labour Economics, Subjective Well-being, Health Economics, Economics of Ageing
Member of the Centre for Labour Market Research (CeLMR), the Scottish Experimental Economics Laboratory (SEEL) and the Just Transition Lab (JTL).
Research Areas
Economics
Research Specialisms
- Applied Economics
Our research specialisms are based on the Higher Education Classification of Subjects (HECoS) which is HESA open data, published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
Current Research
My current research projects investigate:
- Employment contracts and wellbeing
- Labour market effects of energy transition
- Educational mismatch
- Labour supply elasticities near retirement
- Union and nonunion forms of worker voice
- Skills shortages from the firm's point of view
- Labour market (earnings) discrimination
Past Research
Determinants of trade unionism
Public-private wage determination and differentials
Knowledge Exchange
Interview on Faculti, Performance-related Pay, Mental and Physiological Health found here: https://faculti.net/performance-related-pay-mental-and-physiological-health/
Podcast: Performance-related Pay: The Good, The Bad, The Stressful found here: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/engage/podcasts/explorathon-lunch-bytes-episode-2.php
School teaching resource on performance-related pay and stress: How does the type of payment you receive impact your health?
Supervision
I generally supervise PhD topics in various aspects of applied labour economics.
Funding and Grants
- 'A Just Transition for Workers and Communities in the North-East of Scotland', Uplift Foundation (please see the following website for more information: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/geosciences/research/research-projects-2144.php#panel2149)
- 'Performance-Related Pay and Health: An Interdisciplinary Study', ESRC (please see the following website for more information: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/business/research/PRPH.php)
- 'Performance Pay and Stress: A Pilot Study', Scottish Economic Society
- Teaching
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Programmes
- Undergraduate, 4 year, September start
This is the undergraduate Economics degree with all the joint honors programmes that are associated with it.
- Postgraduate, 3 stage, September start
Teaching Responsibilities
For the 2023-24 first teaching session, I will be coordinating EC1006 (Economics of Business and Society) and the QB5027: Employment Relations in Qatar as well as helping with the teaching of BU501S: Employment Relations. In the second teaching session, I will be supervising undergraduate Economics Dissertations (EC4526) .
- Publications
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Page 3 of 3 Results 51 to 68 of 68
Controlling for endogeneity in the health-socioeconomic status relationship of the near retired
Journal of Socio-Economics, vol. 38, no. 6, pp. 977-987Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socec.2009.07.009
- [OPEN ACCESS] http://aura.abdn.ac.uk/bitstream/2164/2546/1/Health_SES_Final_Draft.pdf
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Constrained by hours and restricted in wages: The quality of matches in the labor market
Economic Inquiry, vol. 47, no. 3, pp. 512-529Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1465-7295.2008.00159.x
Educational Mismatch among PhDs: Determinants and Consequences
Science and Engineering Careers in the United States: An analysis of markets and employment. Freeman, R., Goroff, D. (eds.). University of Chicago Press, pp. 229-255, 27 pagesChapters in Books, Reports and Conference Proceedings: ChaptersHow are pension integration and pension benefits related?
The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, vol. 49, no. 1, pp. 26-41Contributions to Journals: ArticlesAre there differences in the health-socio-economic status relationship over the life cycle?: Evidence from Germany
Labour, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 107-125Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9914.2007.00400.x
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Replacing income in retirement for the newly retired: A distributional analysis of gross and net replacement rates
Journal of Income Distribution, vol. 16, no. 2, pp. 83-105Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Unemployment and Other Measures of Labor Market Inefficiency: A Comparison of UK and US Labor Markets 1931-1996
Economic Inquiry, vol. 44, no. 4, pp. 629-643Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/ei/cbj039
Job satisfaction of the highly educated: The role of gender, academic tenure, and earnings
Scottish Journal of Political Economy, vol. 53, no. 2, pp. 253-279Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9485.2006.00379.x
Risk compensation for hospital workers: Evidence from relative wages of janitors
Industrial & labor relations review, vol. 59, no. 2, pp. 226-242Contributions to Journals: ArticlesJob satisfaction and gender segregation
Oxford Economic Papers, vol. 57, no. 3, pp. 479-496Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oep/gpi015
Examining equality between public- and private-sector wage distributions
Economic Inquiry, vol. 41, no. 1, pp. 62-79Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/ei/41.1.62
Test statistics and critical values in selectivity models
Chapters in Books, Reports and Conference Proceedings: Conference Proceedings- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0731-9053(03)17004-1
Money and Real Wages and Employment Levels: International Comparisons
Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, pp. 621-638Contributions to Journals: ArticlesTrade union membership, tenure and the level of job insecurity
Applied Economics, vol. 31, no. 1, pp. 123-135Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/000368499324615
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
The central government-private sector wage differential
Journal of Economic Surveys, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 177-220Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6419.00052
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
The changing determinants of U.S. Unionism: An analysis using worker-level data
Journal of Labor Research, vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 403-423Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12122-997-1047-y
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Decentralization and pay reform in central government: A study of three countries
British Journal of Industrial Relations, vol. 35, no. 3, pp. 447-475Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8543.00063
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Specification issues in the modelling of union status determination
Applied Economics Letters, vol. 4, no. 8, pp. 481-485Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/758536630
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus