Does low power distance culture contribute to lower long-term unemployment?

In this paper we use European Social Survey (2012) microdata from 23 countries to assess the relationship between culture a person is facing at work and the probability of experiencing long- term unemployment by this person. The cultural factors that are tested are: the degree of freedom at work and influence on managerial decisions, which are treated as an indication of the level of power distance. The hypothesis is that low power distance culture encourages employees to gain more hard and soft skills as more responsibility is delegated to them. In our research we follow the concept that cultural factors are among root causes of economic outcomes. The low power distance approach to a subordinate resembles methods applied by personalized Active Labour Market Policies. Both approaches intend to make people aware of their responsibility for their economic outcomes and their power to improve these outcomes. The logit model proved a statistical significance of a relationship between cultural variables and probability of being long-term unemployed even after controlling for age, education, type of work, country and other control variables.