Other Paper

Team composition and knowledge transfer within an ageing workforce

Abstract

This paper examines the transfer of know-how from old/experienced workers to their junior co-workers and how it is a¤ected by the ageing of the workforce. We consider an OLG framework, where agents from di¤erent age groups form partnerships/teams to produce some output. Where teams are composed of young workers and experienced old workers there is scope for a costly transfer of knowledge. We derive the team structure and training rates for the social optimum and for a decentral setting, where matching and training rates are determined by the interplay of supply and demand. We show under which conditions population ageing leads to a reduction in training and establish the decentral outcomes for the cases where fees are determined competitively and by bargaining, respectively. We assess the efficiency of the decentral outcomes and discuss how it depends on the age structure. Our model lends itself to the analysis of knowledge transfer within professional partnerships.