Speaker：He Haoran

Time：10:00AM, Monday, November 9,2020

Venue：Tencent Meeting：906 592 935（code：1893）

Abstract：We explore the impact of wage offers on job applications, testing implications of the directed search model and trying to distinguish it from random search. We use a field experiment conducted on a Chinese job board, with real jobs for which we randomly varied the wage offer across three ranges. We find that higher wage offers raise application rates overall, which is consistent with directed search but can also arise with random search. We also find that higher wage offers raise application rates for job seekers with reservation wages lower than all wage offers, and the increase in application rates is stronger for those with higher reservation wages. The latter type of evidence is consistent with directed search but not random search. Hence, they lend support to directed search models, while also showing that evidence on wage offers and applications that does not consider the reservation wage can overstate the evidence for directed search.

Introduction to the Speaker：He Haoran, Ph.D. in Economics, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, Professor, Doctoral Supervisor, National Athlete, School of Economics and Business Administration, Beijing Normal University. The main research areas are behavioral economics, experimental economics, labor market, pro-social behavior, team decision-making, and public policy evaluation. In recent years, published in Journal of Labor Economics, Experimental Economics, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Journal of Economic Psychology, Economics Letters, China Economic Review, "Management World", "Economics (Quarterly)", "World Economy" and other journals Published multiple papers.