Skill premia in Mexico: demand and supply factors

Abstract

Skill premia trends for the Mexican urban labour market are analysed, decomposing into demand and supply factors. Moreover, among the former both between and within effects are studied, in line with the Katz and Murphy decomposition. It is shown that demand factors are more important for explaining the initial increment in skill premia, but supply factors are responsible for driving them down. It is concluded that the North American Trade Agreement (NAFTA) favours unskilled labour.

Notes

1 We consider ten industries and four occupation categories: managers and professionals, white collars, blue collars and salesmen.