The labor market remains incredibly tight in the U.S. which usually means fewer people are working. In this case, though, it’s mostly that workers are choosing to work fewer hours. Specifically, higher-earning men have chosen to cut back their hours worked perhaps because the pandemic made them reassess their priorities. That could signal a wider trend toward better work-life balance as more and more workers adjust their work lives to make a similar decision.

Last month, Yongseok Shin, professor of economics in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, published a new working paper, “Where Are the Workers? From Great Resignation to Quiet Quitting,” through the National Bureau of Economic Research with graduate students Dain Lee and Jinhyeok Park.

Installation of Limor Golan as the Laurence H. Meyer Professor of Economics

The ranks of American workers are thinning—often because people aged out of the workforce, or never entered it. Their absence could impede the economy’s ability to grow, and make for a less prosperous future.

While most U.S. workers are putting in fewer hours, men in the top 10% of earners cut back their time on the job the most, according to a new study

The supply of workers is at pre-pandemic levels, but demand is far greater

Dain Lee, Jinhyeok Park, and Yongseok Shin quoted in Bloomberg article on January 9, 2023.

The Department of Economics congratulates Phil Dybvig, the Boatmen's Bancshares Professor of Banking and Finance in the Olin School of Business and Professor of Economics (by courtesy) in Arts & Sciences, on the 2022 Nobel Prize in Economics he shared with Ben Bernanke and Doug Diamond.

Phil has been a generous colleague and an especially supportive mentor for our PhD students. We are all very proud of his accomplishments.

Yongs Shin speaks to NPR's Marketplace on September 21, 2022.

Economist Andrew Jordan uses data analytics to uncover potential bias in the criminal justice system by studying the decisions made by courts, police, and prosecutors.

Yongs Shin was quoted in the Wall Street Journal on July 25, 2022.

This year’s Charles Leven Memorial Prize for the best second year paper has been awarded to...