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DO WAGES EXPLAIN LABOR PARTICIPATION RATES IN THE AGGREGATE AND ACROSS GENDERS?

THE UNITED STATES EXPERIENCE, 1960-2010

Format for the Literature Review

The literature review follows the introduction therefore builds upon the content providing in introduction. Hence, when beginning the literature review, one should briefly remind the reader of the hypothesis and purpose of the study as stated in Chapter one. As one has already been informed, an acceptable proposal written in the future tense can be readily converted into an introduction written in the present and/or past tense. In an acceptable proposal and hence in one’s introduction, one has already established the hypothesis and have stated the hypothesis (or hypotheses) in a functional form and identified tentatively a list of, at least, four scholarly articles which directly relate to the hypothesis in its verbal and functional form. This is key because the functional form of the hypothesis should guide one’s literature review. If you will recall, previously, one had established the following hypothesis in functional form as:

LFPR = f RWh, RWw, DUR, BcWhere

LFPR = labor force participation rate

RWw = real hourly wage

RWh = real weekly wage rate

Bc = business cycle dummy.

Hence, this review of the literature based on any identified articles stated in Chapter One plus any additional articles consulted afterwards as having a bearing on the stated hypothesis will be consulted to provide information on:

the labor participation rate as the dependent variable(LFPR);

the relationship between the labor force participation rate(LFPR) and the real hourly wage(RWh);

the relationship between the labor force participation rate(LFPR) and the real weekly wage(RWw);

the relationship between the labor force participation rate(LFPR) and the business cycle(Bc).

Therefore, these relationship’s should guide one’s review of the relevant literature for this study in the sense of providing a research focus consistent with the study’s intent. The identification of the key information about the dependent variable and about the strategic relationship between the dependent and independent variables requires firstly a summary of each scholarly article. There are, perhaps, several ways to summarize the content of a scholarly article for research purposes but reliance on the article’s abstract for this purpose will be quite insufficient. The abstract provides too little in the way of “raw material” required to write a coherent and cohesive review of the literature. The ‘raw material” for the article summaries can be realized by focusing on each article’s:

hypothesis or hypotheses; purpose and objectives

methodology and research approach;

key findings and recommendations;

how the article relates specifically to the hypothesis or hypotheses in one’s studies.

The above information provided in a two to three page summary for each article will provide the “raw material” required to write a review of the literature. The review, however, is a comparative analysis across the various regarding the variables of strategic relevance to your study’s hypothesis. In this respect, one uses the information from the summary of articles to compare and contrast, if you will, the viewpoints of different authors and scholars regarding , for example, the relationship between LFPR and RWh or LFRP and BC or measurement and conceptual perspectives on LFPR itself. In sum, one seeks to provide a coherent and cohesive analysis of the relevant viewpoints, perspectives and findings of the scholars in a comparative, synthetic and interpretive context. The quality of such a review enhances the scholarly expertise and appeal of one’s research and provides a solid foundation for informing one’s efforts at model building and economic theory in Chapter Three. Please the note that the quality of the literature review sought in this research paper can not be realized by merely providing an author-by-author summary of each scholarly article. Remember, these summaries must be converted into a coherent comparative analysis informed by the hypothesis stated in Chapter one.