The aim of this paper is to analyze the relationship between labor market flexibility and unemployment outcomes. Using a panel of 97 countries from 1985 to 2008, the results of the paper suggest that improvements in labor market flexibility have a statistically and significant negative impact on unemployment outcomes (over unemployment, youth unemployment and long-term unemployment). Among the different labor market flexibility indicators analyzed, hiring and firing regulations and hiring costs are found to have the strongest effect.
"Once again, the quick capacity to overcome economic difficulties in 1995 was insufficient to mark improvements on the labor field." -ILO-Latin America, Editorial, "Labor Outlook 1996" For the first time, this volume compares labor market flexibility across countries in Latin America and the United States. The study uses two performance variables, a price variable measured by real wages and a quantity variable measured alternatively by either employment or unemployment. This paper looks into the structural relationship between output and these variables across 13 countries in Latin America and the United States for the last 20-30 years as a way of measuring the ability of the labor market to absorb output shocks.
Discusses five major topics: the meaning of the term "flexibility", the various forms which it takes in practice, its short-and long-term implications, the diverse forms it may assume in different national contexts, and finally its effectiveness as an instrument of economic and employment policy
Italy's traditionally high unemployment has often been linked to the supposed rigidity of the labour market. In fact, the situation resembles a leopard skin, where competitive, dynamic activities coexist with protected, inefficient sectors.
Austro-Keynesianism (based on an expansionary fiscal policy, a strong currency policy and an incomes policy) can be seen as an explanation for Austria's success in combining low unemployment with moderate inflation, social consensus and informal tripartite co-operation in most fields.
This book is about two polemical issues in labour studies, namely, the notions and determinants of labour productivity and flexibility. This book attempts to develop the notion of labour input flexibility or the capacity of workers to adapt to changes in the environment and its relation with labour productivity. The role of institutions, employment practices, capital-labour relations and labour market policies in determining labour flexibility is emphasized. The chapters look at the experiences of industrialized countries (European countries, the USA, Canada and Japan) and three Latin American countries (Brazil, Chile and Mexico).
Young people are a vulnerable category of workers, finding themselves in a delicate phase of their working life: their first entry into the labour market. In many European countries, youngsters are unemployed or have difficulty finding and obtaining jobs. This situation has deteriorated particularly after the crises, recessions and stagnation that has impacted European economies in recent years. In addition to the cyclical or crisis impact, structural factors are also very important. Additionally, prolonged crises, as in some Eurozone countries, have transformed a significant part of cyclical unemployment in structural (long term) unemployment. Young People and the Labour Market: A Comparative Perspective explores the condition of young people in the labour market. The authors present new evidence from several countries, with a special focus on Europe, and offer a comparative perspective. They investigate questions such as which structural conditions and labour market institutions guarantee better youth performance, which education systems and school-to-work processes are more effective and in which countries is gender differentiation less of an issue. All of the aforementioned, as well as many other comparisons which the authors make, are significant in helping to facilitate the successful design of labour and education policies. As the first investigation by economists to explore the complexity of this topic, this book will be useful to both economists and sociologists who are interested in the role of young people in the labour market, and the problem of youth unemployment.
Using panel data for 15 industrial countries, active labor market policies (ALMPs) are shown to have raised employment rates in the business sector in the 1990s, after controlling for many institutions, country-specific effects, and economic variables. Among such policies, direct subsidies to job creation were the most effective. ALMPs also affected employment rates by reducing real wages below levels allowed by technological growth, changes in the unemployment rate, and institutional and other economic factors. However, part of this wage moderation may be linked to a composition effect because policies were targeted to low-paid individuals. Whether ALMPs are cost-effective from a budgetary perspective remains to be determined, but they are certainly not substitutes for comprehensive institutional reforms.
This report evaluates the comprehensive labour market reforms undertaken in Portugal in 2011-15. It reviews reforms in employment protection legislation, unemployment benefits, activation, collective bargaining, minimum wages and working time, and assesses the available evidence on their impact.
