The Effects of Local Market Conditions on Two Pay-Setting Systems in the Federal Sector
研究了美国联邦政府两种薪酬体系（白领的GS和蓝领的FWS）对地方工资和生活成本的敏感程度，发现FWS紧密挂钩地方市场，而GS虽设计上不依赖地方工资，实际也受其影响。
The authors examine the sensitivity of wage setting in two federal pay systems--the General Schedule (GS) system, covering white-collar workers, and the Federal Wage System (FWS), covering blue-collar workers--to local wages and cost-of-living. In 1978 and 1980, the years of the data, FWS wages were designed to reflect local labor market wage levels, while GS wages were intended to be responsive to national wage trends, independent of local wage levels. The authors find that FWS wages were closely tied to local external market conditions, as intended. However, GS wages, both for new hires and for longer-tenure employees, were also responsive to those conditions (though less so than FWS wages). To circumvent regulations designed to screen out local labor market effects, GS administrators apparently employed such practices as assigning new employees to higher grade levels than were formally warranted.