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The joint impact of labour policies and the “Great Recession” on unemployment in Europe

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  • Dal Bianco, Silvia
  • Bruno, Randolph L.
  • Signorelli, Marcello

Abstract

The paper consists of an empirical analysis of the separate as well as joint impacts on total and youth unemployment of indicators of labour market policies on the one hand, and the financial crisis associated with the “Great Recession” on the other. In particular, we investigate labour market data in the past two decades for the Enlarged Europe and adopt a variable accounting for the idiosyncratic severity shock of the crisis. This time-varying and country-specific crisis variable enables us to test empirically and in a novel way the joint impact of labour market policies and the economic crisis on labour market dynamics even when accounting for common macro shocks.

Suggested Citation

  • Dal Bianco, Silvia & Bruno, Randolph L. & Signorelli, Marcello, 2015. "The joint impact of labour policies and the “Great Recession” on unemployment in Europe," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 3-26.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecosys:v:39:y:2015:i:1:p:3-26
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecosys.2014.06.002
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Unemployment; Youth unemployment; Crisis; Labour market policies;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J65 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment Insurance; Severance Pay; Plant Closings
    • O52 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Europe
    • C23 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Models with Panel Data; Spatio-temporal Models

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